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2. I 


THE  WISDOM   OF  LIFE. 


Le  bonheur  n'est  pas  ctosi  aisie :  il  est  trks- 
difficile  de  le  trouver  en  nous,  et  impossible 
de  le  trouver  ailleurs. 

Cham  fort. 


First  Edition,  March,  1890 ;  Second,  November, 
1890;  Third,  August,  1891 ;  Fourth,  October,  1892; 
Fifth,  October,  1895  ;  Sixth,  October,  1897. 


THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE 


BEING   THE   FIRST    PART   OF 


ARTHUR   SCHOPENHAUER'S 

Hpborismen  3ur  Xebenswetsbeit 


Vitam  inrpendere  vero. — Jvvevau 

TRA  NSLA  TED   WITH  A  PRE  FA  CR 

BY 

T.  BAILEY  SAUNDERS,  M.  A. 


1 

L 
SWAN    SONNEN 

PATERN 

ONDOJ 
SCHEIN 

OSTER 
i397 

&  CO.,  Limited 
square 

/  /  8 


Gleet 


3ji   {VsuWhUv\ 


TRANSLATOR'S  PREFACE. 


Schopenhauer  is  one  of  the  few  philosophers  who 
can  be  generally  understood  without  a  commentary. 
All  his  theories  claim  to  be  drawn  direct  from  the  facts, 
to  be  suggested  by  observation,  and  to  interpret  the 
world  as  it  is  ;  and  whatever  view  he  takes,  he  is  con- 
stant in  his  appeal  to  the  experience  of  common  life. 
This  characteristic  endows  his  style  with  a  freshness 
and  vigour  which  would  be  difficult  to  match  in  the 
philosophical  wiiting  of  any  country,  and  impossible 
in  that  of  Germany.     If  it  were  asked  whether  there 
were  any  circumstances,  apart  from  heredity,  to  which 
he  owed  his  mental  habit,  the  answer  might  be  found 
in  the  abnormal  character  of  his  early  education,  his 
acquaintance  with  the  world  rather  than  with  books, 
the  extensive  travels  of  his  boyhood,  his  ardent  pur- 
suit of  knowledge  for  its  own  sake  and  without  regard 
to  the  emoluments  and  endowments  of  learning.     He 
was  trained  in  realities  even  more  than  in  ideas  ;  and 
hence  he  is  original,  forcible,  clear,  an  enemy  of  all 
philosophic  indefiniteness   and   obscurity ;  so  that  it 
may  well  be  said  of  him,  in  the  words  of  a  writer  in 
the  "  Revue  Contemporaine,"  ce  n'est  pas  unphilosophe 

5793 


ii  TRANSLATOR'S   PREFACE. 

comme  les  autres,  c'est  un  philosophe  qui  a  vu  le 
monde. 

It  is  not  my  purpose,  nor  would  it  be  possible  with- 
in the  limits  of  a  prefatory  note,  to  attempt  an  account 
of  Schopenhauer's  philosophy,  to  indicate  its  sources, 
or  to  suggest  or  rebut  the  objections  which  may  be 
taken  to  it.  M.  Bibot,  in  his  excellent  little  book,  * 
has  done  all  that  is  necessary  in  this  direction.  But 
the  essays  here  presented  need  a  word  of  explanation. 
It  should  be  observed,  and  Schopenhauer  himself  is  at 
pains  to  point  out,  that  his  system  is  like  a  citadel 
with  a  hundred  gates :  at  whatever  point  you  take  it 
up,  wherever  you  make  your  entrance,  you  are  on  the 
road  to  the  centre.  In  this  respect  his  writings 
resemble  a  series  of  essays  composed  in  support  of  a 
single  thesis  ;  a  circumstance  which  led  him  to  insist, 
more  emphatically  even  than  most  philosophers,  that 
for  a  proper  understanding  of  his  system  it  was 
necessary  to  read  every  line  he  had  written.  Perhaps 
it  would  be  more  correct  to  describe  Die  Welt  als  Wille 
und  Vorstellung  as  his  main  thesis,  and  his  other 
treatises  as  merely  corollary  to  it.  The  essays  in  these 
volumes  form  part  of  the  corollary ;  they  are  taken 
from  a  collection  published  towards  the  close  of 
Schopenhauer's  life,  and  by  him  entitled  Parerga  und 
Paralipomena,  as  being  in  the  nature  of  surplusage 
and  illustrative  of  his  main  position.  They  are  by  fai 
*  La  Philosophie  de  Schopenhauer,  par  Th.  Ribot. 


TRANSLATORS   PREFACE.  Ill 

the  most  popular  of  bis  works,  and  since  their  first 
publication  in  1851  they  have  done  much  to  build  up  his 
fame.  Written  so  as  to  be  intelligible  enough  in  them- 
selves, the  tendency  of  many  of  them  is  towards  the 
fundamental  idea  on  which  his  system  is  based.  It  may  , 
therefore  be  convenient  to  summarise  that  idea  in  a  ' 
couple  of  sentences ;  more  especially  as  Schopenhauer 
sometimes  writes  as  if  his  advice  had  been  followed 
and  his  readers  were  acquainted  with  the  whole  of  his 
work. 

All  philosophy  is  in  some  sense  the  endeavour  to 

find  a  inifying  principle,  to  discover  the  most  general 

conception  underlying  the  whole  field  of  nature  and 

of  knowledge.     By  one  of  those  bold  generalisations 

which  occasionally  mark  a  real  advance  in  science, 

Schopenhauer  conceived  this  unifying  principle,  this 

underlying  unity,  to  consist  in  something  analogous 

r     to  that  vill  which  self-consciousness  reveals  to  us. 

Will  is,  according  to  him,  the  fundamental  reality  of 

I     the  world  the  thing-in-itself ;  and  its  objectivation  is  I 

what  is  presented  in  phenomena.     The  struggle  of  the 

will  to  realise  itself  evolves  the  organism,  which  in  its 

turn  evokes  intelligence  as  the  servant  of  the  will. 

And  in  practical  life  the  antagonism  between  the  will 

and  the  in.ellect  arises  from  the  fact  that  the  former 

is  the  metaphysical  substance,   the  latter  something 

accidental  ind  secondary.     And  further,  will  is  desire,  ,- 

that  is  to  say,  need  of  something ;  hence  need   and 


IV  TRANSLATOR'S   PREFACE. 

pain  are  what  is  positive  in  the  world,  and  the  only 
possible  happiness  is  a  negation,  a  renunciation  of  the 
will  to  live. 

It  is  instructive  to  note,  as  M.  Bibot  points  out, 
that  in  finding  the  origin  of  all  things,  not  in  intelli- 
gence, as  some  of  his  predecessors  in  philosophy  had 
done,  but  in  will,  or  the  force  of  nature,  from  which 
all  phenomena  have  developed,  Schopenhauer  was 
anticipating  something  of  the  scientific  spirit  of  the 
nineteenth  century.  To  this  it  may  be  added  that  in 
combating  the  method  of  Fichte  and  Hegel,  who 
spun  a  system  out  of  abstract  ideas,  and  in  discarding 
it  for  one  based  on  observation  and  experience, 
Schopenhauer  can  be  said  to  have  brought  down 
philosophy  from  heaven  to  earth. 

In  Schopenhauer's  view  the  various  forms  of 
Religion  are  no  less  a  product  of  human  ingenuity 
than  Art  or  Science.  He  holds,  in  effect,  that  all 
religions  take  their  rise  in  the  desire  to  explain  the 
world  ;  and  that,  in  regard  to  truth  and  error,  they 
differ,  in  the  main,  not  by  preaching  monotheism, 
polytheism  or  pantheism,  but  in  so  far  as  they 
recognise  pessimism  or  optimism  as  the  tru I  descrip- 
tion of  life.  Hence  any  religion  which  lookecjupon  the 
world  as  being  radically  evil  appealed  to  hip.  as  con- 
taining an  indestructible  element  of  truth  I  have 
endeavoured  to  present  his  view  of  two  of  the  great 
religions  of  the  world  in  the  extract  whfch  comes 


TRANSLATOR  S  PREFACE.  V 

in  the  third  volume,  and  to  which  I  have  given  the 
title  of  The  Christian  System.  The  tenor  of  it  is 
to  show  that,  however  little  he  may  have  been  in 
sympathy  with  the  supernatural  element,  he  owed 
much  to  the  moral  doctrines  of  Christianity  and 
of  Buddhism,  between  which  he  traced  great  resem- 
blance. 

Of  Schopenhauer,  as  of  many  another  writer,  it  may 
be  said  that  he  has  been  misunderstood  and  depreciated 
just  in  the  degree  in  which  he  is  thought  to  be  new  ; 
and  that,  in  treating  of  the  Conduct  of  Life,  he  is,  in 
reality,  valuable  only  in  so  far  as  he  brings  old  truths 
to  remembrance.  His  name  used  to  arouse,  and  in 
certain  quarters  still  arouses,  a  vague  sense  of  alarm  ; 
as  though  he  had  come  to  subvert  all  the  rules  of 
right  thinking  and  all  the  principles  of  good  conduct, 
rather  than  to  proclaim  once  again  and  give  a  new 
meaning  to  truths  with  which  the  world  has  long 
been  familiar.  Of  his  philosophy  in  its  more  tech- 
nical aspects,  as  matter  upon  which  enough,  perhaps; 
has  been  written,  no  account  need  be  taken  here, 
except  as  it  affects  the  form  in  which  he  embodies 
these  truths  or  supplies  the  fresh  light  in  which  he 
sees  them.  For  whatever  claims  to  originality  his 
metaphysical  theory  may  possess,  the  chief  interest  to 
be  found  in  his  views  of  life  is  an  affair  of  form 
rather  than  of  substance ;  and  he  stands  in  a  sphere 
of  his  own,  not  because  he  sets  new  problems  or  opens 


VI  TRANSLATOR  S  PREFACE. 

up  undiscovered  truths,  but  in  the  manner  in  which 
he  approaches  what  has  been  already  revealed. 

He  is  not  on  that  account  less  important ;  for  the 
great  mass  of  men  at  all  times  requires  to  have  old 
truths  imparted  as  if  they  were  new — formulated,  as 
it  were,  directly  for  them  as  individuals,  and  of 
special  application  to  their  own  circumstances  in  life 
A  discussion  of  human  happiness  and  the  way  to 
obtain  it  is  never  either  unnecessary  or  uncalled  for, 
if  one  looks  to  the  extent  to  which  the  lives  of  most 
men  fall  short  of  even  a  poor  ideal,  or,  again,  to  the 
difficulty  of  reaching  any  definite  and  secure  conclu- 
sion. For  to  such  a  momentous  inquiry  as  this,  the 
vast  majority  of  mankind  gives  nothing  more  than  a 
nominal  consideration,  accepting  the  current  belief, 
whatever  it  may  be,  on  authority,  and  taking  as  little 
thought  of  the  grounds  on  which  it  rests  as  a  man 
walking  takes  of  the  motion  of  the  earth.  But  for 
those  who  are  not  indifferent — for  those  whose  desire 
to  fathom  the  mystery  of  existence  gives  them  the 
right  to  be  called  thinking  beings — it  is  just  here,  in 
regard  to  the  conclusion  to  be  reached,  that  a  diffi- 
culty arises,  a  difficulty  affecting  the  conduct  of  life  : 
for  while  the  great  facts  of  existence  are  alike  for  all, 
they  are  variously  appreciated,  and  conclusions  differ, 
chiefly  from  innate  diversity  of  temperament  in  those 
who  draw  them.  It  is  innate  temperament,  acting  on 
a  view  of  the  facts  necessarily  incomplete,  that  has 


TRANSLATORS   PREFACE.  Vll 

inspired  so  many  different  teachers.  The  tendencies 
of  a  man's  own  mind — the  Idols  of  the  Cave  before 
which  he  bows — interpret  the  facts  in  accordance 
with  his  own  nature :  he  elaborates  a  system  containing, 
perhaps,  a  grain  of  truth,  to  which  the  whole  of  life  is 
then  made  to  conform  ;  the  facts  purporting  to  be  the 
foundation  of  the  theory,  and  the  theory  in  its  turn 
giving  its  own  colour  to  the  facts. 

Nor  is  this  error,  the  manipulation  of  facts  to  suit  a 
theory,  avoided  in  the  views  of  life  which  are  pre- 
sented by  Schopenhauer.  It  is  true  that  he  aimed 
especially  at  freeing  himself  from  the  trammels  of 
previous  systems ;  but  he  was  caught  in  those  of  his 
own.  His  natural  desire  was  to  resist  the  common 
appeal  to  anything  extramundane,  anything  outside 
or  beyond  life,  as  the  basis  of  either  hope  or  fear. 
He  tried  to  look  at  life  as  it  is ;  but  the  metaphysical 
theory  on  which  his  whole  philosophy  rests  made  it 
necessary  for  him,  as  he  thought,  to  regard  it  as  an 
unmixed  evil.  He  calls  our  present  existence  an  in- 
finitesimal moment  between  two  eternities,  the  past 
and  the  future,  a  moment,  like  the  life  of  Plato's 
"  Dwellers  in  the  Cave,"  filled  with  the  pursuit  of 
shadows ;  where  everything  is  relative,  phenomenal, 
illusory,  and  man  is  bound  in  the  servitude  of  ignor- 
ance, struggle  and  need,  in  the  endless  round  of  effort 
and  failure.  If  you  confine  yourself,  says  Schopen- 
hauer, only  to   some   of   its   small   details,  life  may 


viii  translator's  preface. 


I 


indeed  appear  to  be  a  comedy,  because  of  the  one  or 
two  bright  spots  of  happy  circumstance  to  be  found 
in  it  here  and  there ;  but  when  you  reach  a  higher 
point  of  view  and  a  broader  outlook,  these  soon 
become  invisible,  and  Life,  seen  from  the  distance 
which  brings  out  the  true  proportion  of  all  its  parts, 
is  revealed  as  a  tragedy — a  long  record  of  struggle 
/  and  pain,  with  the  death  of  the  hero  as  the  final, 
certainty.  How  then,  he  asks,  can  a  man  make  the 
best  of  his  brief  hour  under  the  hard  conditions  of 
his  destiny  ?     What  is  the  true  Wisdom  of  Life  ? 

Schopenhauer  has  no  pre-conceived  divine  plan  to 
vindicate ;  no  religious  or  moral  enthusiasm  to  give  a 
roseate  hue  to  some  far-off  event,  obliging  us  in  the 
end  to  think  that  all  things  work  together  for  good. 
Let  poets  and  theologians  give  play  to  imagination ! 
he,  at  any  rate,  will  profess  no  knowledge  of  any- 
thing beyond  our  ken.  If  our  existence  does  not 
entirely  fail  of  its  aim,  it  must,  he  says,  be  suffering  ; 
for  this  is  what  meets  us  everywhere  in  the  world, 
and  it  is  absurd  to  look  upon  it  as  the  result  of 
chance.  Still,  in  the  face  of  all  this  suffering,  and  in 
spite  of  the  fact  that  the  uncertainty  of  life  destroys 
its  value  as  an  end  in  itself,  every  man's  natural 
desire  is  to  preserve  his  existence ;  jso  that  life  is  a 
blind,  unreasoning  force,  hurrying  us  we  know  not 
whither.  From  his  high  metaphysical  standpoint, 
Schopenhauer  is  ready  to  admit  that  there  are  many 


TRANSLATOR  S  PREFACE.  ix 

things  in  life  which  give  a  short  satisfaction  and 
blind  us  for  the  moment  to  the  realities  of  existence, — 
pleasures  as  they  may  be  called,  in  so  far  as  they  are 
a  mode  of  relief;  but  that  pleasure  is  not  positive  in 
its  nature  nor  anything  more  than  the  negation  of 
suffering,  is  proved  by  the  fact  that,  if  pleasures 
come  in  abundance,  pain  soon  returns  in  the  form  of 
satiety ;  so  that  the  sense  of  illusion  is  all  that  has- 
been  gained.  Hence,  the  most  a  man  can  achieve  in* 
the  way  of  welfare  is  a  measure  of  relief  from  this 
suffering  ;  and  if  people  were  prudent,  it  is  at  this 
they  would  aim,  instead  of  trying  to  secure  a  happi- 
ness which  always  flies  from  them. 

It  is  a  trite  saying  that  happiness  is  a  delusion,  a 
chimaera,  the  fata  morgana  of  the  heart ;  but  here  is  a 
writer  who  will  bring  our  whole  conduct  into  line 
with  it,  as  a  matter  of  practice;  making  pain  the 
positive  groundwork  of  life,  and  a  desire  to  escape  it 
the  spur  of  all  effort.  While  most  of  those  who  treat 
of  the  conduct  of  life  come  at  last  to  the  conclusion, 
more  or  less  vaguely  expressed,  that  religion  and 
morality  form  a  positive  source  of  true  happiness, 
Schopenhauer  does  not  professedly  take  this  view; 
though  it  is  quite  true  that  the  practical  outcome  of 
his  remarks  tends,  as  will  be  seen,  to  support  it. 
His  method  is  different :  he  does  not  direct  the 
imagination  to  anything  outside  this  present  life  as 
making  it  worth  while  to  live  at  all ;  his  object  is  to 


X  TRANSLATOR S  PREFACE. 

state  the  facts  of  existence  as  they  immediately 
appear,  and  to  draw  conclusions  as  to  what  a  wise 
man  will  do  in  the  face  of  them. 

In  the  practical  outcome  of  Schopenhauer's  ethics — 
the  end  and  aim  of  those  maxims  of  conduct  which 
he  recommends,  there  is  nothing  that  is  not  sub- 
stantially akin  to  theories  of  life  which,  in  different 
forms,  the  greater  part  of  mankind  is  presumed  to 
hold  in  reverence.  It  is  the  premises  rather  than  the 
conclusion  of  his  argument  which  interest  us  as  some- 
thing new.  The  whole  world,  he  says,  with  all  its 
phenomena  of  change,  growth  and  development,  is 
ultimately  the  manifestation  of  Will — Wille  und 
Vorstellung — a  blind  force  conscious  of  itself  only 
when  it  reaches  the  stage  of  intellect.  And  life  is  a 
constant  self-assertion  of  this  will,  a  long  desire  which  J 
is  never  fulfilled.  Disillusion  inevitably  follows 
upon  attainment,  because  the  will,  the  thing-in- 
itself — in  philosophical  language,  the  noumenon — 
always  remains  as  the  permanent  element ;  and  with 
this  persistent  exercise  of  its  claim,  it  can  never  be 
satisfied.  So  life  is  essentially  suffering ;  and  the  only  \L 
remedy  for  it  is  the  freedom  of  the  intellect  from  the 
servitude  imposed  by  its  master,  the  will. 

The  happiness  a  man  can  attain,  is  thus,  in  Schopen- 
hauer's view,  negative  only ;  but  how  is  it  to  be 
acquired  ?  Some  temporary  relief,  he  says,  may  be 
obtained   through   the   medium   of  Art;  for  in   the 


translator's  preface.  xi 

apprehension  of  Art  we  are  raised  out  of  our  bondage^ 
contemplating  objects  of  thought  as  they  are  in  them- 
selves, apart  from  their  relations  to  our  own  ephemeral 
existence,  and  free  from  any  taint  of  the  will.  This 
contemplation  of  pure  thought  is  destroyed  when  Art 
is  degraded  from  its  lofty  sphere,  and  made  an  instru- 
ment in  the  bondage  of  the  will.  How  few  of  those  who 
feel  that  the  pleasure  of  Art  transcends  all  others  could 
give  such  a  striking  explanation  of  their  feeling  ! 

But  the  highest  ethical  duty,  and  consequently  the 
supreme  endeavour  after  happiness,  is  to  withdraw 
from  the  struggle  of  life,  and  so  obtain  release  from 
the  misery  which  that  struggle  imposes  upon  all,  even 
upon  those  who  are  for  the  moment  successful.  For 
as  will  is  the  inmost  kernel  of  everything,  so  it  is 
identical  under  all  its  manifestations ;  and  through 
the  mirror  of  the  world  a  man  may  arrive  at  the 
knowledge  of  himself.  The  recognition  of  the 
identity  of  our  own  nature  with  that  of  others  is  the 
beginning  and  foundation  of  all  true  morality.  For 
when  a  man  clearly  perceives  this  solidarity  of  the 
will,  there  is  aroused  in  him  a  feeling  of  sympathy 
,.  which  is  the  main-spring  of  ethical  conduct.  This 
feeling  of  sympathy  must,  in  any  true  moral  system, 
prevent  our  obtaining  success  at  the  price  of  others' 
loss.  Justice,  in  this  theory,  comes  to  be  a  noble, 
enlightened  self-interest;  it  will  forbid  our  doing 
wrong  to  onr  fellow-man,  because,  in  injuring  him,  we 


xii  translator's  preface. 

are  injuring  ourselves — our  own  nature,  which  is 
identical  with  his.  On  the  other  hand,  the  recogni- 
tion of  this  identity  of  the  will  must  lead  to  com- 
miseration— a  feeling  of  sympathy  with  our  fellow- 
sufferers-— to  acts  of  kindness  and  benevolence,  to  the 
manifestation  of  what  Kant,  in  the  Metaphysic  of 
Ethics,  calls  the  only  absolute  good,  the  good  will.  In 
Schopenhauer's  phraseology,  the  human  will,  in  other 
words,  epo)<s,  the  love  of  life,  is  in  itself  the  root  of  all 
evil,  and  goodness  lies  in  renouncing  it.  Theoreti- 
cally, his  ethical  doctrine  is  the  extreme  of  socialism, 
in  a  large  sense  ;  a  recognition  of  the  inner  identity 
and  equal  claims,  of  all  men  with  ourselves ;  a 
recognition  issuing  in  dydirrj,  universal  benevolence, 
and  a  stifling  of  particular  desires. 

It  may  come  as  a  surprise  to  those  who  affect  to 
hold  Schopenhauer  in  abhorrence,  without,  perhaps, 
really  knowing  the  nature  of  his  views,  that,  in  this 
theory  of  the  essential  evil  of  the  human  will — 'ipus, 
the  common  selfish  idea  of  life — he  is  reflecting  and 
indeed  probably  borrowing  what  he  describes  as  the 
fundamental  tenet  of  Christian  theology,  that  the 
whole  creation  groaneth  and  travaileth  in  pain,1  stand- 
ing in  need  of  redemption.  Though  Schopenhauer 
was  no  friend  to  Christian  theology  in  its  ordinary 
tendencies,  he  was  very  much  in  sympathy  with  some 
of  the  doctrines  which  have  been  connected  with  it. 
1  Romans  viii. ,  22. 


TRANSLATOR  S  PREFACE.  Xlll 

In  his  opinion  the  foremost  truth  which  Christianity 
proclaimed  to  the  world  lay  in  its  recognition  of 
pessimism,  its  view  that  the  world  was  essentially 
corrupt,  and  that  the  devil  was  its  prince  or  ruler.1 
It  would  be  out  of  place  here  to  inquire  into  the  exact 
meaning  of  this  statement,  or  to  determine  the  pre- 
cise form  of  compensation  provided  for  the  ills  of  life 
under  any  scheme  of  doctrine  which  passes  for  Chris- 
tian •,  and  even  if  it  were  in  place,  the  task  would  be 
an  extremely  difficult  one  ;  for  probably  no  system  of 
belief  has  ever  undergone,  at  various  periods,  more 
radical  changes  than  Christianity.  But  whatever 
prospect  of  happiness  it  may  have  held  out,  at  an 
early  date  of  its  history,  it  soon  came  to  teach  that 
the  necessary  preparation  for  happiness,  as  a  positive 
spiritual  state,  is  renunciation,  resignation,  a  looking 
away  from  external  life  to  the  inner  life  of  the  soul — 
a  kingdom  not  of  this  world.  So  far,  at  least,  as  con- 
cerns its  view  of  the  world  itself,  and  the  main  lesson 
and  duty  which  life  teaches,  there  is  nothing  in  the 
theory  of  pessimism  which  does  not  accord  with  that 
religion  which  is  looked  up  to  as  the  guide  of  life  over 
a  great  part  of  the  civilised  world. 

What   Schopenhauer   does  is  to  attempt   a   meta- 
physical explanation  of  the  evil  of  life,  without  any 
reference  to    anything    outside   it.      Philosophy,   he 
urges,  should  be  cosmology,  not  theology  ;  an  explana- 
1  John  xii. ,  31.  l 


xiv  TRANSLATORS  PREFACE. 

tion  of  the  world,  not  a  scheme  of  divine  knowledge  : 
it  should  leave  the  gods  alone — to  use  an  ancient 
phrase — and  claim  to  be  left  alone  in  return.  Scho- 
penhauer was  not  concerned,  as  the  apostles  and 
fathers  of  the  Church  were  concerned,  to  formulate  a 
scheme  by  which  the  ills  of  this  life  should  be 
remedied  in  another — an  appeal  to  the  poor  and 
oppressed,  conveyed  often  in  a  material  form,  as,  for 
instance,  in  the  story  of  Dives  and  Lazarus.  In  his 
theory  of  life  as  the  self-assertion  of  will,  he  endeav- 
ours to  account  for  the  sin,  misery  and  iniquity  of  the 
world,  and  to  point  to  the  way  of  escape  by  the  denial 
of  the  will  to  live. 

Though  Schopenhauer's  views  of  life  have  this 
much  in  common  with  certain  aspects  of  Christian 
doctrine,  they  are  in  decided  antagonism  with  another 
theory  which,  though,  comparatively  speaking,  the 
birth  of  yesterday,  has  already  been  dignified  by  the 
name  of  a  religion,  and  has,  no  doubt,  a  certain 
number  of  followers.  It  is  the  theory  which  looks 
upon  the  life  of  mankind  as  a  continual  progress 
towards  a  state  of  perfection,  and  humanity  in  its 
nobler  tendencies  as  itself  worthy  of  worship.  To 
those  who  embrace  this  theory,  it  will  seem  that 
because  Schopenhauer  does  not  hesitate  to  declare  the 
evil  in  the  life  of  mankind  to  be  far  in  excess  of  the 
good,  and  M  as  long  as  the  human  will  remains 
what  it  is,  any  radical  change  for  the  better  to  be  im- 


TRANSLATOR'S  PREFACE.  XV 

possible,  he  is  therefore  outside  the  pale  of  civilisation, 
an  alien  from  the  commonwealth  of  ordered  know- 
ledge and  progress.  But  it  has  yet  to  be  seen  how 
the  religion  of  humanity  will  fare,  either  as  a  theory 
of  conduct  or  as  a  guide  of  life. 

If  there  is  any  one  doctrine  more  than  another 
which  has  distinguished  Christianity  wherever  it  has 
been  a  living  force  among  its  adherents,  it  is  the 
doctrine  of  renunciation;  the  same  doctrine  which, 
in  a  different  shape  and  with  other  surroundings, 
forms  the  spirit  of  Buddhism.  With  those  great 
religions  of  the  world  which  mankind  has  hitherto 
professed  to  revere  as  the  most  ennobling  of  all  in- 
fluences, Schopenhauer's  theories,  not  perhaps  in  their 
details,  but  in  the  principle  which  informs  them,  are, 
as  we  have  seen,  in  close  alliance.  According  to 
him,  too,  renunciation,  in  the  same  sense,  is  the 
truest  wisdom  of  life,  from  the  higher  ethical  stand- 
point. His  heroes  are  the  Christian  ascetics  of  the 
Middle  Age,  and  the  followers  of  Buddha  who  turn  away 
from  the  Sansara  to  the  Nirvana.  But  our  modern 
habits  of  thought  are  different.  We  look  askance  at 
the  doctrines,  and  we  have  no  great  enthusiasm  for 
the  heroes.  The  system  which  is  in  vogue  amongst 
us  just  now  objects  to  the  identification  of  nature 
with  evil,  and,  in  fact,  abandons  ethical  dualism  alto- 
gether. yAnd  if  nature  is  not  evil,  where,  it  will  be 
asked,  is  the  necessity  or  the  benefit  of  renunciation 


Xvi  TRANSLATOR  S  PREFACE. 

— a  question  which  may  even  come  to  be  generally- 
raised,  in  a  not  very  distant  future,  on  behalf  of  some 
new  conception  of  Christianity.  And  from  another 
point  of  view,  let  it  be  most  fully  and  frankly 
admitted  that  renunciation  is  incompatible  with 
ordinary  practice,  with  the  rules  of  life  as  we  are 
compelled  to  formulate  them ;  and  that,  to  the  vast 
majority,  the  doctrine  seems  little  but  a  mockery,  a 
hopelessly  unworkable  plan,  inapplicable  to  the  con- 
ditions under  which  men  have  to  exist. 

In  spite  of  the  fact  that  he  is  theoretically  in 
sympathy  with  truths  which  lie  at  the  foundation  of 
certain  widely  revered  systems,  the  world  has  not  yet 
accepted  Schopenhauer  for  what  he  proclaimed  him* 
self  to  be,  a  great  teacher-  and  probably  for  the  reason 
that  hope  is  not  an  element  in  his  wisdom  of  life,  and 
that  he  attenuates  love  into  something  that  is  not  a 
real,  living  force — a  shadowy  recognition  of  the 
identity  of  the  will.  For  men  are  disinclined  to 
welcome  a  theory  which  neither  flatters  their  present 
position  nor  holds  out  any  prospect  of  better  things 
to  come.  Optimism — the  belief  that  in  the  end 
everything  will  be  for  the  best — is  the  natural  creed 
of  mankind ;  and  a  writer  who  of  set  purpose  seeks 
to  undermine  it  by  an  appeal  to  facts  is  regarded  as 
one  who  tries  to  rob  humanity  of  its  rights.  How 
seldom  an  appeal  to  the  facts  within  our  reach  is 
really  made !     Whether  the  evil  of  life  actually  out- 


translator's  preface.  xvii 

weighs  the  good ;  or,  if  we  should  look  for  better 
things,  what  is  the  possibility  or  the  nature  of  a 
Future  Life,  either  for  ourselves  as  individuals,  or  as 
part  of  some  great  whole,  or,  again,  as  contributing  to 
a  coming  state  of  perfection? — such  inquiries  claim  an 
amount  of  attention  which  the  mass  of  men  every- 
where is  unwilling  to  give.  But,  in  any  case,  whether 
it  is  a  vague  assent  to  current  beliefs,  or  a  blind  reliance 
on  a  baseless  certainty,  or  an  impartial  attempt  to  put 
away  what  is  false, — hope  remains  as  the  deepest 
foundation  of  every  faith  in  a  happy  future. 

But  it  should  be  observed  that  this  looking  to  the 
future  as  a  complement  for  the  present  is  dictated 
mainly  by  the  desire  to  remedy  existing  ills ;  and 
that  the  great  hold  which  religion  has  on  mankind,  as 
an  incentive  to  present  happiness,  is  the  promise  it 
makes  of  coming  perfection.  Hope  for  the  future  is 
a  tacit  admission  of  evil  in  the  present ;  for  if  a  man 
is  completely  happy  in  this  life,  and  looks  upon 
happiness  as  the  prevailing  order,  he  will  not  think 
over  much  of  another.  So  a  discussion  of  the  nature  of 
happiness  is  not  thought  complete  if  it  takes  account 
only  of  our  present  life,  and  unless  it  connects  what 
we  are  now  and  what  we  do  here  with  what  we  may 
be  hereafter.  Schopenhauer's  theory  does  not  profess 
to  do  this :  it  promises  no  positive  good  to  the_ia- 
dividual,  at  most,  only  relief ;  he  breaks  the  idol  of 
the  world,  and  sets  up  nothing  in  its  place ;  and  like 


XV111  TRANSLATOR'S  PREFACE. 

many  another  iconoclast,  he  has  long  been  condemned 
by  those  whose  temples  he  has  desecrated.  If  there 
are  optimistic  theories  of  life,  it  is  not  life  itself,  he 
would  argue,  which  gives  colour  to  them  ;  it  is  rather 
the  reflection  of  some  great  final  cause  which  humanity 
has  created  as  the  last  hope  of  its  redemption : — 

Heaven  but  the  vision  of  fulfilled  desire, 
And  hell  the  shadow  from  a  soul  071  fire, 

Cast  on  the  darkness  into  which  ourselves, 
So  late  emerged  from,  shall  so  soon  expire. l 

Still,  hope,  it  may  be  said,  is  not  knowledge,  nor  a 
real  answer  to  any  question ;  at  most,  a  makeshift,  a 
moral  support  for  intellectual  weakness.  The  truth 
is  that,  as  theories,  both  optimism  and  pessimism  are 
failures,  because  they  are  extreme  views  where  only 
a  very  partial  judgment  is  possible.  And  in  view  of 
the  great  uncertainty  of  all  answers,  most  of  those 
who  do  not  accept  a  stereotyped  system  leave  the 
question  alone,  as  being  either  of  little  interest,  or  of 
no  bearing  on  the  welfare  of  their  lives,  which  are 
commonly  satisfied  with  low  aims ;  tacitly  ridiculing 
those  who  demand  an  answer  as  the  most  pressing 
affair  of  existence.  But  the  fact  that  the  final  pro- 
blems of  the  world  are  still  open,  makes  in  favour  of 
an  honest  attempt  to  think  them  out,  in  spite  of  all 
previous  failure  or  still  existing  difficulty ;  and  how- 

1  Omar  Khayyam  ;  translated  by  E.  Fitzgerald. 


TRANSLATOR  S   PREFACE.  XIX 

ever  old  these  problems  may  be,  the  endeavour  tc 
solve  them  is  one  which  it  is  always  worth  while  to 
encourage  afresh.  For  the  individual  advantages 
which  attend  an  effort  to  find  the  true  path  accrue 
quite  apart  from  any  success  in  reaching  the  goal; 
and  even  though  the  height  we  strive  to  climb  be 
inaccessible,  we  can  still  see  and  understand  more 
than  those  who  never  leave  the  plain.  The  sphere,  it 
is  true,  is  enormous.  It  is  the  world  and  life  and 
destiny  as  a  whole ;  and  our  mental  vision  is  so  ill- 
adapted  to  a  range  of  this  extent  that  to  aim  at  form- 
ing a  complete  scheme  is  to  attempt  the  impossible. 
It  must  be  recognised  that  the  data  are  insufficient  for 
large  views,  and  that  we  ought  not  to  go  beyond  the 
facts  we  have,  the  facts  of  ordinary  life,  interpreted 
by  the  common  experience  of  every  day.  These  form 
our  only  material.  The  views  we  take  must  of 
necessity  be  fragmentary ;  they  can  be  little  but 
apergus,  rough  guesses  at  the  undiscovered,  or  else  of 
the  same  nature  as  all  our  possessions  in  the  way  of 
knowledge — small  tracts  of  solid  land  reclaimed  from 
the  mysterious  ocean  of  the  unknown. 

But  if  we  do  not  admit  Schopenhauer  to  be  a  great 
teacher,  because  he  is  out  of  sympathy  with  the 
highest  aspirations  of  mankind,  and  too  ready  to 
dogmatise  from  partial  views,  he  is  a  very  suggestive 
writer,  and  eminently  readable.  His  style  is  brilliant, 
animated,  forcible,  pungent;  although  it  is  also  dis- 


XX  TRANSLATOR'S  PREFACE. 

cursive,  irresponsible,  and  with  a  tendency  to  super- 
ficial generalisation.  He  brings  i  n  the  most  unexpected 
topics  without  any  very  sure  sense  of  their  relative 
place ;  everything,  in  fact,  seems  to  be  fair  game,  when 
he  has  taken  up  his  pen.  His  irony  is  noteworthy ; 
for  it  extends  beyond  mere  isolated  sentences,  and 
sometimes  applies  to  whole  passages,  which  must  be 
read  cum  grano  satis.  And  if  he  has  grave  faults  as 
well  as  excellences  of  literary  treatment,  he  is  at  least 
always  witty  and  amusing,  and  that,  too,  in  dealing 
with  subjects — as  here,  for  instance, with  the  Conduct  of 
Life — on  which  many  others  have  been  at  once  severe 
and  dull.  It  is  easy  to  complain  that  though  he  is 
witty  and  amusing,  he  is  often  at  the  same  time  bitter 
and  ill-natured.  This  is  in  some  measure  the  un- 
pleasant side  of  his  uncompromising  devotion  to  truth, 
his  resolute  eagerness  to  dispel  illusion  at  any  cost — 
those  defects  of  his  qualities  which  were  intensified  by 
a  solitary  and,  until  his  last  years,  unappreciated  life. 
He  was  naturally  more  disposed  to  coerce  than  to 
flatter  the  world  into  accepting  his  views ;  he  was 
above  all  things  un  esprit  fort,  and  at  times  brutal 
in  the  use  of  his  strength.  If  it  should  be  urged  that, 
however  great  his  literary  qualities,  he  is  not  worth 
reading  because  he  takes  a  narrow  view  of  life  and  is 
blind  to  some  of  its  greatest  blessings,  it  will  be  well 
to  remember  the  profound  truth  of  that  line  which  a 
friend  inscribed  on  his   earliest  biography :    Si  non 


TRANSLATOR'S  preface,  xxi 

errasset  fecerat  ille  minus,1  a  truth  which  is  seldom 
without  application,  whatever  be  the  form  of  human 
effort.  Schopenhauer  cannot  be  neglected  because  he 
takes  an  unpleasant  view  of  existence,  for  it  is  a  view 
which  must  present  itself,  at  some  time,  to  every 
thoughtful  person.  To  be  outraged  by  Schopenhauer 
means  to  be  ignorant  of  many  of  the  facts  of  life. 

In  the  volumes  containing  his  Aphorismen  zur 
Lebensweisheit,  Schopenhauer  abandons  the  high  meta- 
physical standpoint,  and  discusses,  with  the  same  zest 
and  appreciation  as  in  fact  marked  his  enjoyment  of 
them,  some  of  the  pleasures  which  a  wise  man  will 
seek  to  obtain, — health,  moderate  possessions,  intel- 
lectual riches.  And  when,  as  in  this  little  work,  he 
comes  to  speak  of  the  wisdom  of  life  as  the  practical 
art  of  living,  the  pessimist  view  of  human  destiny  is 
obtruded  as  little  as  possible.  His  remarks  profess  to 
be  the  result  of  a  compromise — an  attempt  to  judge 
life  by  the  common  standards.  He  is  content  to 
call  these  witty  and  instructive  pages  a  series  of 
aphorisms;  thereby  indicating  that  he  makes  no  claim 
to  expound  a  complete  theory  of  conduct.  It  will 
doubtless  occur  to  any  intelligent  reader  that  his  ob- 
servations are  but  fragmentary  thoughts  on  various 
phases  of  life;  and,  in  reality,  mere  aphorisms — in  the 
old,  Greek  sense  of  the  word — pithy  distinctions, 
definitions  of  facts,  a  marking-ofT,  as  it  were,  of  the 
1  Slightly  altered  from  Martial.     Epigram  :  I.  xxii. 


xxh  translator's  preface. 

true  from  the  false  in  some  of  our  ordinary  notions  of 
life  and  prosperity.  Here  there  is  little  that  is  not  in 
complete  harmony  with  precepts  to  which  the  world 
has  long  been  accustomed ;  and  in  this  respect,  also, 
Schopenhauer  offers  a  suggestive  comparison  rather 
than  a  contrast  with  most  writers  on  happiness. 

The  philosopher  in  his  study  is  conscious  that  the 
world  is  never  likely  to  embrace  his  higher  metaphy- 
sical or  ethical  standpoint,  and  annihilate  the  will  to 
live ;  nor  did  Schopenhauer  himself  do  so  except  so  far 
as,  in  common  with  most  serious  students  of  life,  he 
avoided  the  ordinary  aims  of  mankind.  The  theory 
which  recommended  universal  benevolence  as  the 
highest  ethical  duty,  came,  in  personal  practice,  to 
mean  a  formal  standing-aloof — the  ne  plus  ultra  of 
individualism.  Wisdom,  as  the  ordinary  art  of  living, 
he  took  to  be  a  compromise.  We  are  here  not  by 
any  choice  of  our  own  ;  and  while  we  strive  to  make 
the  best  of  it,  we  must  not  let  ourselves  be  deceived. 
If  we  want  to  be  happy,  he  says,  it  will  not  do  to 
cherish  illusions.  Schopenhauer  would  have  found 
nothing  admirable  in  the  conclusion  at  which  the  late 
M.  Edmond  Scherer,  for  instance,  arrived.  L'art  de 
vivre,  he  wrote  in  his  preface  to  Amiel's  Journal,  c'esl 
de  se  faire  une  raison,  de  souscrire  au  compromis,  de  se 
preter  aux  fictions.  Schopenhauer  conceives  his  mis- 
sion to  be,  rather,  to  dispel  illusion,  to  tear  the  mask 
from  life  ; — a  violent  operation,  not  always  productive 


TRANSLATOR  S  PREFACE.  XX111 

of  good.  Some  illusion,  he  urges,  may  profitably  bo 
dispelled  by  recognising  that  no  amount  of  external 
aid  will  make  up  for  inward  deficiency  ;  and  that  if  a 
man  has  not  got  the  elements  of  happiness  in  himself, 
all  the  pride,  pleasure,  beauty  and  interest  of  the 
world  will  not  give  it  to  him.  Success  in  life,  as 
gauged  by  the  ordinary  material  standard,  means  to 
place  faith  wholly  in  externals  as  the  source  of  happi- 
ness, to  assert  and  emphasize  the  common  will  to  live, 
in  a  word,  to  be  vulgar.  He  protests  against  this 
search  for  happiness — something  subjective — in  the 
world  of  our  surroundings,  or  anywhere  but  in  a 
man's  own  self;  a  protest  the  sincerity  of  which 
might  well  be  imitated  by  some  professed  advocates 
of  spiritual  claims. 

It  would  be  interesting  to  place  his  utterances  or 
this  point  side  by  side  with  those  of  a  distinguished 
interpreter  of  nature  in  this  country,  who  has  recently 
attracted  thousands  of  readers  by  describing  The  -  '(JA-ocJ~ 
Pleasures  of  Life ;  in  other  words,  the  blessings  which 
the  world  holds  out  to  all  who  can  enjoy  them — 
health,  books,  friends,  travel,  education,  art.  On  the 
common  ground  of  their  regard  for  these  pleasures 
there  is  no  disagreement  between  the  optimist  and  the 
pessimist.  But  a  characteristic  difference  of  view 
may  be  found  in  the  application  of  a  rule  of  life 
which  Schopenhauer  seems  never  to  tire  of  repeating  ; 
namely,  that  happiness  consists  for  the  most  part  in 


xxiv  translator's  preface. 

what  a  man  is  in  himself,  and  that  the  pleasure  he 
derives  from  these  blessings  will  depend  entirely  upon 
the  extent  to  which  his  personality  really  allows  him 
to  appreciate  them.  This  is  a  rule  which  runs  some 
risk  of  being  overlooked  when  a  writer  tries  to 
dazzle  the  mind's  eye  by  describing  all  the  possible 
sources  of  pleasure  in  the  world  of  our  surroundings  ; 
but  Sir  John  Lubbock,  in  common  with  every  one 
who  attempts  a  fundamental  answer  to  the  question  of 
happiness,  cannot  afford  to  overlook  it.  The  truth  of 
the  rule  is  perhaps  taken  for  granted  in  his  account  of 
life's  pleasures  ;  but  it  is  significant  that  it  is  only 
when  he  comes  to  speak  of  life's  troubles  that  he 
freely  admits  the  force  of  it.  Happiness,  he  says,  in 
this  latter  connection,  depends  much  more  on  what  is 
within  than  without  us.  Yet  a  rigid  application  of  this 
truth  might  perhaps  discount  the  effect  of  those 
pleasures  with  which  the  world  is  said  to  abound. 
That  happiness  as  well  as  unhappiness  depends  mainly 
upon  what  is  within,  is  more  clearly  recognised  in  the 
case  of  trouble ;  for  when  troubles  come  upon  a  man, 
they  influence  him,  as  a  rule,  much  more  deeply  than 
pleasures.  How  few,  even  amongst  the  millions  to 
whom  these  blessings  are  open — health,  books,  travel, 
art — really  find  any  true  or  permanent  happiness  in 
them  ! 

While  Schopenhauer's  view  of  the  pleasures  of  life 
may  be  elucidated  by  comparing  it  with  that  of  a 


TRANSLATOR'S  PREFACE.  XXV 

popular  writer  like  Sir  John  Lubbock,  and  by  con- 
trasting the  appeals  they  severally  make  to  the  outer 
and  the  inner  world  as  a  source  of  happiness, 
Schopenhauer's  view  of  life  itself  will  stand  out  more 
clearly  if  we  remember  the  opinion  so  boldly  ex- 
pressed by  the  same  English  writer.  If  we  resolutely 
look,  observes  Sir  John  Lubbock,  I  do  not  say  at 
the  bright  side  of  things,  but  at  things  as  they  really 
are ;  if  we  avail  ourselves  of  the  manifold  blessings 
which  surround  us;  we  cannot  but  feel  that  life  is 
indeed  a  glorious  inheritance.1  There  is  a  splendid 
excess  of  optimism  about  this  statement  which  well 
fits  it  to  show  up  the  darker  picture  drawn  by  the 
German  philosopher. 

Finally,   it   should    be   remembered    that    though 
Schopenhauer's  picture  of  the  world  is  gloomy  and 
sombre,  there   is  nothing  weak   or  unmanly  in  his 
attitude.     If  a  happy  existence,  he  says, — not  merely 
an  existence  free  from  pain — is  denied  us,  we  can  at 
least   be    heroes    and  face    life   with   courage :    das 
hochste  was  der  Mensch  erlangen  kann  ist  ein  heroischer 
Lebenslauf     A  noble  character  will  never  complain  at 
misfortune;  for  if  a  man  looks  round  him  at  other 
manifestations  of  that  which  is  his  own  inner  nature, 
the  will,  he  finds  sorrows  happening  to  his  fellow-men 
harder  to  bear  than  any  that  have  come  upon  himself. 
And   the  ideal  of  nobility  is   to  deserve   the  praise 
1  The  Pleasures  of  Life.     Part  I.,  p.  5. 


XXVI  TRANSLATOR  S  PREFACE. 

which  Hamlet — in  Shakespeare's  Tragedy  of  Pessim- 
ism— gave  to  his  friend  : 

Thou  hast  been 
As  one,  in  suffering  all,  that  suffers  nothing. 

But  perhaps  Schopenhauer's  theory  carries  with  it 
its  owd  correction.  He  describes  existence  as  a  more 
or  less  violent  oscillation  between  pain  and  boredom. 
If  this  were  really  the  sum  of  life,  and  we  had  to 
reason  from  such  a  partial  view,  it  is  obvious  that 
happiness  would  lie  in  action ;  and  that  life  would  be 
so  constituted  as  to  supply  two  natural  and  inevitable 
incentives  to  action,  and  thus  to  contain  in  itself  the 
very  conditions  of  happiness.  Life  itself  reveals  our 
destiny.  It  is  not  the  struggle  which  produces  misery, 
it  is  the  mistaken  aims  and  the  low  ideals — was  uns 
alle  bdndigt,  das  Gemeine !  That  life  is  an  evil  is  a 
deduction,  and  possibly  a  mistaken  deduction,  from 
his  metaphysical  creed.  Whether  his  scheme  of  things 
is  correct  or  not — and  it  shares  the  common  fate  of  all 
metaphysical  systems  in  being  unverifiable,  and  to 
that  extent  unprofitable — he  will  in  the  last  resort 
have  made  good  his  claim  to  be  read  by  his  insight 
into  the  varied  needs  of  human  life.  It  may  be  that 
a  future  age  will  consign  his  metaphysics  to  the 
philosophical  lumber-room ;  but  he  is  a  literary  artist 
as  well  as  a  philosopher,  and  he  can  make  a  bid  for 
fame  in  either  capacity.  T.  B.  S. 

December,  1889. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAP. 

FAOB 

Introduction           .           .           .           . 

I 

I. 

Division  of  the  Subject    . 

3 

II. 

Personality,  or  what  a  Man  is  . 

.    15 

III. 

Property, 

OR  WHAT  A  Man  has    . 

.    48 

IV. 

Position,  or  a  Man's  Place  in  the  Estimation 

of  Others — 

Sect. 

i.  Reputation 

•       59 

3» 

2.  Pride    .... 

.      63 

»» 

3.  Rank    .... 

.       72 

*♦ 

4.  Honour            ... 

•       73 

M 

5.  Farns  .... 

.     116 

INTRODUCTION. 


In  these  pages  I  shall  speak  of  The  Wisdom  of  Life  in 
the  common  meaning  of  the  term,  as  the  art,  namely, 
of  ordering  our  lives  so  as  to  obtain  the  greatest 
possible  amount  of  pleasure  and  success ;  an  art  the 
theory  of  which  may  be  called  Eudcemonology,  for  it 
teaches  us  how  to  lead  a  happy  existence.  Such  an 
existence  might  perhaps  be  defined  as  one  which, 
looked  at  from  a  purely  objective  point  of  view,  or, 
rather,  after  cool  and  mature  reflection — for  the 
question  necessarily  involves  subjective  considerations, 
— would  be  decidedly  preferable  to  non-existence ; 
implying  that  we  should  cling  to  it  for  its  own  sake, 
and  not  merely  from  the  fear  of  death ;  and  further, 
that  we  should  never  like  it  to  come  to  an  end. 

Now  whether  human  life  corresponds,  or  could 
possibly  correspond,  to  this  conception  of  existence,  is 
a  question  to  which,  as  is  well-known,  my  philoso- 
phical system  returns  a  negative  answer.  On  the 
eudsemonistic  hypothesis,  however,  the  question  must 
be  answered  in  the  affirmative  ;  and  I  have  shown,  in 
the  second  volume  of  my  chief  work  (ch.  49),  that 
this  hypothesis  is  based  upon  a  fundamental  mistake. 
Accordingly,  in  elaborating  the  scheme  of  a  happy 
existence,  I  have  had  to  make  a  complete  surrender 
of  the  higher  metaphysical  and  ethical  standpoint  tc 


2  ,     .'  ■  INTRODUCTION. 

which  my  own  theories  lead ;  and  everything  I  shall 
say  here  will  to  some  extent  rest  upon  a  compromise ; 
in  so  far,  that  is,  as  I  take  the  common  standpoint  of 
every  day,  and  embrace  the  error  which  is  at  the 
bottom  of  it.  My  remarks,  therefore,  will  possess 
only  a  qualified  value,  for  the  very  word  eudosmono- 
logy  is  a  euphemism.  Further,  I  make  no  claims  to 
completeness ;  partly  because  the  subject  is  inex- 
haustible, and  partly  because  I  should  otherwise  have 
to  say  over  again  what  has  been  already  said  by 
others. 

The  only  book  composed,  as  far  as  I  remember, 
with  a  like  purpose  to  that  which  animates  this 
collection  of  aphorisms,  is  Cardan's  Be  utilitate  ex 
ttdversis  capiendo,,  which  is  well  worth  reading,  and 
may  be  used  to  supplement  the  present  work. 
Aristotle,  it  is  true,  has  a  few  words  on  eudsemono- 
logy  in  the  fifth  chapter  of  the  first  book  of  his 
Rhetoric;  but  what  he  says  does  not  come  to  very 
much.  As  compilation  is  not  my  business,  I  have 
made  no  use  of  these  predecessors;  more  especially 
because  in  the  process  of  compiling  individuality  of 
view  is  lost,  and  individuality  of  view  is  the  kernel 
of  works  of  this  kind.  In  general,  indeed,  the  wise 
in  all  ages  have  always  said  the  same  thing,  and  the 
fools,  who  at  all  times  form  the  immense  majority, 
have  in  their  way,  too,  acted  alike,  and  done  j  ust  the 
opposite;  and  so  it  will  continue.  For,  as  Voltaire 
says,  we  shall  leave  this  world  as  foolish  and  as 
wicked  as  we  found  it  on  our  arrival. 


THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE 


CHAPTER  I. 


DIVISION   OF  THE  SUBJECT. 


Aristotle1  divides  the  blessings  of  life  iDto  three 
classes — those  which  come  to  us  from  without,  those 
of  the  soul,  and  those  of  the  body.  Keeping  nothing 
of  this  division  but  the  number,  I  observe  that  the 
fundamental  differences  in  human  lot  may  be  reduced 
to  three  distinct  classes  : 

(1)  What  a  man  is :  that  is  to  say,  personality,  in 
the  widest  sense  of  the  word ;  under  which  are  in- 
cluded health,  strength,  beauty,  temperament,  moral 
character,  intelligence  and  education. 

(2)  What  a  man  has :  that  is,  property  and  posses- 
sions of  every  kind. 

(3)  How  a  man  stands  in  the  estimation  of  others : 
by  which  is  to  be  understood,  as  everybody  knows, 
what  a  man  is  in  the  eyes  of  his  fellow-men,  or,  more 
strictly,  the  light  in  which  they  regard  him.  This  is 
shown  by  their  opinion  of  him ;  and  their  opinion  is  in 
its  turn  manifested  by  the  honour  in  which  he  is  held, 
and  by  his  rank  and  reputation. 

1  Eth.  Nichom.,  I.  8. 


4  THE  WISDOM   OF  LIFE. 

The  differences  which  come  under  the  first  head  are 
those  which  Nature  herself  has  set  between  man  and 
man ;  and  from  this  fact  alone  we  may  at  once  infer 
that  they  influence  the  happiness  or  unhappiness  of 
mankind  in  a  much  more  vital  and  radical  way  than 
those  contained  under  the  two  following  heads,  which 
are  merely  the  effect  of  human  arrangements.  Com- 
pared with  genuine  personal  advantages,  such  as  a 
great  mind  or  a  great  heart,  all  the  privileges  of  rank 
or  birth,  even  of  royal  birth,  are  but  as  kings  on  the 
stage  to  kings  in  real  life.  The  same  thing  was  said 
long  ago  by ,  Metrodorus,  the  earliest  disciple  of 
Epicurus,  who  wrote  as  the  title  of  one  of  his  chapters, 
The  happiness  we  receive  from  ourselves-  is  greater 
than  that  which  we  obtain  from  our  surroundings.1 
And  it  is  an  obvious  fact,  which  cannot  be  called  in 
question,  that  the  principal  element  in  a  man's  well- 
being, — indeed,  in  the  whole  tenor  of  his  existence, — is 
what  he  is  made  of,  his  inner  constitution.  For  this 
is  the  immediate  source  of  that  inward  satisfaction  or 
dissatisfaction  resulting  from  the  sum  total  of  his 
sensations,  desires  and  thoughts  ;  whilst  his  surround- 
ings, on  the  other  hand,  exert  only  a  mediate  or 
indirect  influence  upon  him.  This  is  why  the  same 
external  events  or  circumstances  affect  no  two  people 
alike ;  even  with  perfectly  similar  surroundings  every 
one  lives  in  a  wTorld  of  his  own.  For  a  man  has 
immediate  apprehension  only  of  his  own  ideas,  feelings 
and  volitions ;  the  outer  world  can  influence  him  only 
in  so  far  as  it  brings  these  to  life.  The  world  in 
which  a  man  lives  shapes  itself  chiefly  by  the  way  in 
1  Cf.  Clemens  Alex.  Strom.  II.,  21. 


DIVISION  OF  THE  SUBJECT.  5 

which  he  looks  at  it,  and  so  it  proves  different  to 
different  men ;  to  one  it  is  barren,  dull,  and  super- 
ficial ;  to  another  rich,  interesting,  and  full  of  meaning. 
On  hearing  of  the  interesting  events  which  have  hap- 
pened in  the  course  of  a  man's  experience,  many  people 
will  wish  that  similar  things  had  happened  in  their  lives 
too,  completely  forgetting  that  they  should  be  envious 
-  rather  of  the  mental  aptitude  which  lent  those  events 
the  significance  they  possess  when  he  describes  them. 
To  a  man  of  genius  they  were  interesting  adventures ; 
but  to  the  dull  perceptions  of  an  ordinary  individual 
they  would  have  been  stale,  everyday  occurrences. 
This  is  in  the  highest  degree  the  case  with  many  of 
Goethe's  and  Byron's  poems,  which  are  obviously 
founded  upon  actual  facts;  where  it  is  open  to  a 
foolish  reader  to  envy  the  poet  because  so  many 
delightful  things  happened  to  him,  instead  of  envying 
that  mighty  power  of  phantasy  which  was  capable  of 
turning  a  fairly  common  experience  into  something 
so  great  and  beautiful. 

In  the  same  way,  a  person  of  melancholy  tempera- 
ment will  make  a  scene  in  a  tragedy  out  of  what 
appears  to  the  sanguine  man  only  in  the  light  of  an 
interesting  conflict,  and  to  a  phlegmatic  soul  as  some- 
thing without  any  meaning.  This  all  rests  upon 
the  fact  that  every  event,  in  order  to  be  realised  and 
appreciated,  requires  the  co-operation  of  two  factors, 
namely,  a  subject  and  an  object ;  although  these  are 
as  closely  and  necessarily  connected  as  oxygen  and 
hydrogen  in  water.  When  therefore  the  objective  or 
external  factor  in  an  experience  is  actually  the  same, 
but  the  subjective  or  personal  appreciation  of  it  varies, 


6  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

the  event  is  just  as  much  a  different  one  in  the  eyes  of 
different  persons  as  if  the  objective  factors  had  not 
been  alike ;  for  to  a  blunt  intelligence  the  fairest  and 
best  object  in  the  world  presents  only  a  poor  reality 
and  is  therefore  only  poorly  appreciated, — like  a  fine 
landscape  in  dull  weather,  or  in  the  reflection  of  a  bad 
camera  obscura.  In  plain  language,  every  man  is 
pent  up  within  the  limits  of  his  own  consciousness, 
and  cannot  directly  get  beyond  those  limits  any  more 
than  he  can  get  beyond  his  own  skin  ;  so  external  aid 
is  not  of  much  use  to  him.  On  the  stage,  one  man  is 
a  prince,  another  a  minister,  a  third  a  servant  or  a 
soldier  or  a  general,  and  so  on, — mere  external  differ- 
ences :  the  inner  reality,  the  kernel  of  all  these  appear- 
ances is  the  same — a  poor  player,  with  all  the  anxieties 
of  his  lot.  In  life  it  is  just  the  same.  Differences  of 
rank  and  wealth  give  every  man  his  part  to  play,  but 
this  by  no  means  implies  a  difference  of  inward  happi- 
ness and  pleasure ;  here,  too,  there  is  the  same  being 
in  all — a  poor  mortal,  with  his  hardships  and  troubles. 
Though  these  may,  indeed,  in  every  case  proceed  from 
dissimilar  causes,  they  are  in  their  essential  nature 
much  the  same  in  all  their  forms,  with  degrees  of 
intensity  which  vary,  no  doubt,  but  in  no  wise  corre- 
spond to  the  part  a  man  has  to  play,  or  the  presence  or 
absence  of  position  and  wealth.  Since  everything 
which  exists  or  happens  for  a  man  exists  only  in  his 
consciousness  and  happens  for  it  alone,  the  most  essen- 
tial thing  for  a  man  is  the  constitution  of  this  con- 
sciousness, which  is  in  most  cases  far  more  important 
than  the  circumstances  which  go  to  form  its  contents. 
All  the  pride  and  pleasure  of  the  world,  mirrored  in 


DIVISION   OF  THE  SUBJECT.  7 

the  dull  consciousness  of  a  fool,  is  poor  indeed  com* 
pared  with  the  imagination  of  Cervantes  writing  his 
Don  Quixote  in  a  miserable  prison.  The  objective  half 
of  life  and  reality  is  in  the  hand  of  fate,  and  accord- 
ingly takes  various  forms  in  different  cases :  the 
subjective  half  is  ourself,  and  in  essentials  it  always 
remains  the  same. 

Hence  the  life  of  every  man  is  stamped  with  the 
same  character  throughout,  however  much  his  exter- 
nal circumstances  may  alter ;  it  is  like  a  series  of 
variations  on  a  single  theme.  No  one  can  get  beyond 
his  own  individuality.  An  animal,  under  whatever 
circumstances  it  is  placed,  remains  within  the  narrow 
limits  to  which  nature  has  irrevocably  consigned  it;  so 
that  our  endeavours  to  make  a  pet  happy  must  always 
keep  within  the  compass  of  its  nature,  and  be  restricted 
to  what  it  can  feel.  So  it  is  with  man  ;  the  measure 
of  the  happiness  he  can  attain  is  determined  before- 
hand by  his  individuality.  More  especially  is  this  the 
case  with  the  mental  powers,  which  fix  once  for  all  his 
capacity  for  the  higher  kinds  of  pleasure.;  If  these  powers 
are  small,  no  efforts  from  without,  nothing  that  his 
fellow-men  or  that  fortune  can  do  for  him,  will  suffice  to 
raise  him  above  the  ordinary  degree  of  human  happi- 
ness and  pleasure,  half  animal  though  it  be.  His  only 
resources  are  his  sensual  appetite, — a  cosy  and  cheerful 
family  life  at  the  most, — low  company  and  vulgar 
pastime ;  even  education,  on  the  whole,  can  avail 
little,  if  anything,  for  the  enlargement  of  his  horizon. 
For  the  highest,  most  varied  and  lasting  pleasures  are 
those  of  the  mind,  however  much  our  youth  may 
deceive  us  on  this  point ;    and  the  pleasures  of  tho 


8  THE   WISDOM   OF   LIFE. 

mind  turn  chiefly  on  the  powers  of  the  mind.  It  is 
clear,  then,  that  our  happiness  depends  in  a  great 
degree  upon  what  we  are,  upon  our  individuality, 
whilst  lot  or  destiny  is  generally  taken  to  mean  only 
what  we  have,  or  our  refutation.  Our  lot,  in  this 
sense,  may  improve  ;  but  we  do  not  ask  much  of  it  if 
we  are  inwardly  rich :  on  the  other  hand,  a  fool 
remains  a  fool,  a  dull  blockhead,  to  his  last  hour,  even 
though  he  were  surrounded  by  houris  in  paradise. 
This  is  why  Goethe,  in  the  West-ostlicher  Divan,  says 
that  every  man,  whether  he  occupy  a  low  position  in 
life,  or  emerges  as  its  victor,  testifies  to  personality  as 
the  greatest  factor  in  happiness  : — 

Voile  und  Knecht  und  Ueberwinder 

Sie  gestehen,  zu  jeder  Zeit, 
Hb'chstes  Gluclc  der  Erdeiikinder 

Sei  nur  die  Personlichkeit. 

Common  experience  shows  that  the  subjective 
element  in  life  is  incomparably  more  important  for 
our  happiness  and  pleasure  than  the  objective,  from 
such  sayings  as  Hunger  is  the  best  sauce,  and  Youth 
and  Age  cannot  live  together,  up  to  the  life  of  the 
Genius  and  the  Saint.  Health  outweighs  all  other 
blessings  so  much  that  one  may  really  say  that  a 
healthy  beggar  is  happier  than  an  ailing  king.  A 
quiet  and  cheerful  temperament,  happy  in  the  enjoy- 
ment of  a  perfectly  sound  physique,  an  intellect  clear, 
lively,  penetrating  and  seeing  things  as  they  are,  a 
moderate  and  gentle  will,  and  therefore  a  good  con- 
science— these  are  privileges  which  no  rank  or  wealth 
can  make  up  for  or  replace.     For  what  a  man  is  in 


DIVISION   OF  THE  SUBJECT.  9 

himself,  what  accompanies  him  when  he  is  alone,  what 
no  one  can  give  or  take  away,  is  obviously  more 
essential  to  him  than  everything  he  has  in  the  way  of 
possessions,  or  even  what  he  may  be  in  the  e}7es  of 
the  world.  An  intellectual  man  in  complete  solitude 
has  excellent  entertainment  in  his  own  thoughts  and 
fancies,  whilst  no  amount  or  diversity  of  social 
pleasure,  theatres,  excursions  and  amusements,  can 
ward  oif  boredom  from  a  dullard.  A  good,  temperate, 
gentle  character  can  be  happy  in  needy  circumstances, 
whilst  a  covetous,  envious  and  malicious  man,  even  if 
he  be  the  richest  in  the  world,  goes  miserable.  Nay 
more ;  to  one  who  has  the  constant  delight  of  a  special 
individuality,  with  a  high  degree  of  intellect,  most  of 
the  pleasures  which  are  run  after  by  mankind  are 
perfectly  superfluous ;  they  are  even  a  trouble 
and  a  burden.  And  so  Horace  says  of  himself,  that, 
however  many  are  deprived  of  the  fancy-goods 
of  life,  there  is  one  at  least  who  can  live  without 
them : — 

Gemmas,  marmor,  ebur,  Tyrrhena  sigilla,  tabellas, 

Argentum,  vestes  Ga&ulo  murice  tinctas 

Sunt  qui  non  habeant,  est  qui  non  curat  habere  ; 

and  when  Socrates  saw  various  articles  of  luxury 
spread  out  for  sale,  he  exclaimed :  How  much  there  is 
in  the  world  that  I  do  not  want. 

So  the  first  and  most  essential  element  in  our  life's 
happiness  is  what  we  are, — our  personality,  if  for  no 
other  reason  than  that  it  is  a  constant  factor  coming 
into  play  under  all  circumstances.  Besides,  unlike  the 
blessings  which  are  described  under  the  other  two 


10  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

heads,  it  is  not  the  sport  of  destiny  and  cannot  be 
wrested  from  us ;— and,  so  far,  it  is  endowed  with  an 
absolute  value  in  contrast  to  the  merely  relative 
worth  of  the  other  two.  The  consequence  of  this  is 
that  it  is  much  more  difficult  than  people  commonly 
suppose  to  get  a  hold  on  a  man  from  without.  But 
here  the  all-powerful  agent,  Time,  comes  in  and  claims 
its  rights,  and  before  its  influence  physical  and 
mental  advantages  gradually  waste  away.  Moral 
character  alone  remains  inaccessible  to  it.  In  view  of 
the  destructive  effect  of  time,  it  seems,  indeed,  as  if 
the  blessings  named  under  the  other  two  heads,  of 
which  time  cannot  directly  rob  us,  were  superior  to 
those  of  the  first.  Another  advantage  might  be 
claimed  for  them,  namely,  that  being  in  their  very 
nature  objective  and  external,  they  are  attainable, 
and  every  one  is  presented  with  the  possibility,  at 
least,  of  coming  into  possession  of  them  ;  whilst  what  is 
subjective  is  not  open  to  us  to  acquire,  but  making  its 
entry  by  a  kind  of  divine  right,  it  remains  for  life, 
immutable,  inalienable,  an  inexorable  doom.  Let 
me  quote  those  lines  in  which  Goethe  describes  how  an 
unalterable  destiny  is  assigned  to  every  man  at  the  hour 
of  his  birth,  so  that  he  can  develope  only  in  the  lines 
laid  down  for  him,  as  it  were,  by  the  conjunctions  of 
the  stars ;  and  how  the  Sibyl  and  the  prophets  declare 
that  himself  a  man  can  never  escape,  nor  any  power 
of  time  avail  to  change  the  path  on  which  his  life 
is  cast : — 

Wie  an  dem  Tag,  der  dich  der  Welt  verliehe?i, 
Die  Sonne  stand  zum  Grusse  der  Planeten, 
Bist  alsobald  void  fort  und  fort  gediehen, 


DIVISION  OF  THE  SUBJECT.  11 

Nack  dem  Gesetz,  wonach  du  angetreten. 
So  musst  du  sein,  dir  Icawnst  du  nicht  entjliehen, 
So  sagten  schon  Sibyllen  und  Propheten  ; 
TJnd  keine  Zeit  und  keine  Macht  zerstiiclielt 
Geprdgte  Form,  die  lebend  sich  enturiekelt. 

The  only  thing  that  stands  in  our  power  to  achieve, 
is  to  make  the  most  advantageous  use  possible  of  the 
»  personal  qualities  we  possess,  and  accordingly  to 
follow  such  pursuits  only  as  will  call  them  into  play, 
to  strive  after  the  kind  of  perfection  of  which  they 
admit  and  to  avoid  every  other ;  consequently,  to  choose 
the  position,  occupation  and  manner  of  life  which  are 
most  suitable  for  their  development. 

Imagine  a  man  endowed  with  herculean  strength 
who  is  compelled  by  circumstances  to  follow  a  seden- 
tary occupation,  some  minute  exquisite  work  of  the 
hands,  for  example,  or  to  engage  in  study  and  mental 
labour  demanding  quite  other  powers,  and  just  those 
which  he  has  not  got, — compelled,  that  is,  to  leave 
unused  the  powers  in  which  he  is  pre-eminently 
strong ;  a  man  placed  like  this  will  never  feel  happy  all 
his  life  through.  Even  more  miserable  will  be  the  lot 
of  the  man  with  intellectual  powers  of  a  very  high 
order,  who  has  to  leave  them  undeveloped  and  un- 
employed, in  the  pursuit  of  a  calling  which  does  not 
require  them,  some  bodily  labour,  perhaps,  for  which 
his  strength  is  insufficient.  Still,  in  a  case  of  this 
kind,  it  should  be  our  care,  especially  in  youth,  to 
avoid  the  precipice  of  presumption,  and  not  ascribe  to 
ourselves  a  superfluity  of  power  which  is  not  there. 

Since  the  blessings  described  under  the  first  head 
decidedly  outweigh  those  contained  under  the  other 


12  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

two,  *t>  va  manifestly  a  wiser  course  to  aim  at  the 
maintenance  of  our  health  and  the  cultivation  of  our 
faculties,  than  at  the  amassing  of  wealth;  but  this 
must  not  be  mistaken  as  meaning  that  we  should 
neglect  to  acquire  an  adequate  supply  of  the  necessaries 
of  life.  Wealth,  in  the  strict  sense  of  the  word,  that 
is,  great  superfluity,  can  do  little  for  our  happiness ; 
and  many  rich  people  feel  unhappy  just  because  they 
are 'without  any  true  mental  culture  or  knowledge, 
and  consequently  have  no  objective  interests  which 
would  qualify  them  for  intellectual  occupations.  For 
beyond  the  satisfaction  of  some  real  and  natural 
necessities,  all  that  the  possession  of  wealth  can  achieve 
has  a  very  small  influence  upon  our  happiness,  in  the 
proper  sense  of  the  word ;  indeed,  wealth  rather  dis- 
turbs it,  because  the  preservation  of  property  entails 
a  great  many  unavoidable  anxieties.  And  still  men 
are  a  thousand  times  more  intent  on  becoming  rich 
than  on  acquiring  culture,  though  it  is  quite  certain 
that  what  a  man  is  contributes  much  more  to  his 
happiness  than  what  he  has.  So  you  may  see  many 
a  man,  as  industrious  as  an  ant,  ceaselessly  occupied 
from  morning  to  night  in  the  endeavour  to  increase 
his  heap  of  gold.  Beyond  the  narrow  horizon  of 
means  to  this  end,  he  knows  nothing ;  his  mind  is  a 
blank,  and  consequently  unsusceptible  to  any  other 
influence.  The  highest  pleasures,  those  of  the  in- 
tellect, are  to  him  inaccessible,  and  he  tries  in  vain 
to  replace  them  by  the  fleeting  pleasures  of  sense  in 
which  he  indulges,  lasting  but  a  brief  hour  and  at 
tremendous  cost.  And  if  he  is  lucky,  his  struggles 
result  in  his  having  a  really  .great  pile  of  gold,  which 


DIVISION   OF  THE  SUBJECT.  13 

he  leaves  to  his  heir,  either  to  make  it  still  larger,  or 
to  squander  it  in  extravagance.  A  life  like  this, 
though  pursued  with  a  sense  of  earnestness  and  an 
air  of  importance,  is  just  as  silly  as  many  another 
which  has  a  fool's  cap  for  its  symbol. 

What  a  man  has  in  himself  is,  then,  the  chief 
element  in  his  happiness.  Because  this  is,  as  a  rule, 
so  very  little,  most  of  those  who  are  placed  beyond 
the  struggle  with  penury,  feel  at  bottom  quite  as  un- 
happy as  those  who  are  still  engaged  in  it.  Their 
minds  are  vacant,  their  imagination  dull,  their  spirits 
poor,  and  so  they  are  driven  to  the  company  of  those 
like  them — for  siwdlis  simili  gaudet — where  they 
make  common  pursuit  of  pastime  and  entertainment, 
consisting  for  the  most  part  in  sensual  pleasure, 
amusement  of  every  kind,  and  finally,  in  excels 
and  libertinism.  A  young  man  of  rich  family  enter,-* 
upon  life  with  a  large  patrimony,  and  often  runs 
through  it  in  an  incredibly  short  space  of  time,  in 
vicious  extravagance ;  and  why  ?  Simply  because, 
here  too,  the  mind  is  empty  and  void,  and  so  the  man 
is  bored  with  existence.  He  was  sent  forth  into 
the  world  outwardly  rich  but  inwardly  poor,  and  his 
vain  endeavour  was  to  make  his  external  wealth 
compensate  for  his  inner  poverty,  by  trying  to  obtain 
everything  from  without,  like  an  old  maii  who  seeks 
to  strengthen  himself  as  King  David  or  Marechal  de 
Ketz  tried  to  do.  And  so  in  the  end  one  who  is  in- 
wardly poor  comes  to  be  also  poor  outwardly. 

I  need  not  insist  upon  the  importance  of  the  other 
two  kinds  of  blessings  which  make  up  the  happiness 
of  human  life ;  now-a-days  the  value  of  possessing 


14  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

them  is  too  well  known  to  require  advertisement. 
The  third  class,  it  is  true,  may  seem,  compared  with 
the  second,  of  a  very  ethereal  character,  as  it  consists 
only  of  other  people's  opinions.  Still  everyone  has  to 
strive  for  reputation,  that  is  to  say,  a  good  name.  Kank, 
on  the  other  hand,  should  be  aspired  to  only  by  those 
who  serve  the  State,  and  fame  by  very  few  indeed. 
In  any  case,  reputation  is  looked  upon  as  a  priceless 
treasure,  and  fame  as  the  most  precious  of  all  the 
blessings  a  man  can  attain, — the  Golden  Fleece,  as  it 
were,  of  the  elect :  whilst  only  fools  will  prefer  rank 
to  property.  The  second  and  third  classes,  moreover, 
are  reciprocally  cause  and  effect ;  so  far  that  is,  as 
Petronius'  maxim,  habes  habeberis,  is  true ;  and  con- 
versely, the  favour  of  others,  in  all  its  forms,  of teu 
puts  us  in  the  way  of  ^retting  what  we  want 


\ 


CHAPTER  II 

PERSONALITY,   OR  WHAT  A  MAN   IS. 

We  have  already  seen,  in  general,  that  what  a  man  ia 
contributes  much  more  to  his  happiness  than  what  he 
has,  or  how  he  is  regarded  by  others.  What  a  man  is, 
and  so  what  he  has  in  his  own  person,  is  always  the 
chief  thing  to  consider ;  for  his  individuality  accom- 
panies him  always  and  everywhere,  and  gives  its 
colour  to  all  his  experiences.  In  every  kind  of  enjoy- 
ment, for  instance,  the  pleasure  depends  principally 
upon  the  man  himself.  Every  one  admits  this  in 
regard  to  physical,  and  how  much  truer  it  is  of  intel- 
lectual, pleasure.  When  we  use  that  English  expres- 
sion, "  to  enjoy  oneself,"  we  are  employing  a  very 
striking  and  appropriate  phrase ;  for  observe — one 
says,  not  "  he  enjoys  Paris,"  but  "  he  enjoys  himself  in 
Paris."  To  a  man  possessed  of  an  ill-conditioned 
individuality,  all  pleasure  is  like  delicate  wine  in  a 
mouth  made  bitter  with  gall.  Therefore,  in  the  bless- 
ings as  well  as  in  the  ills  of  life,  less  depends  upon 
what  befalls  us  than  upon  the  way  in  which  it  is  met, 
that  is,  upon  the  kind  and  degree  of  our  general 
susceptibility.  What  a  man  is  and  has  in  himself, — in 
a  word,  personality,  with  all  it  entails,  is  the  only  im- 
mediate and  direct  factor  in  his  happiness  and  welfare. 
All  else  is  mediate  and  indirect,  and  its  influence  czn 
be  neutralised  and  frustrated ;  but  the  influence  of 
personality  never.  This  is  why  the  envy  which  per- 
sonal qualities  excite  is  the  most  implacable  of  all, — as 
it  is  also  the  most  carefulLy  dissembled. 


; 
V 


16  THE  WISDOM   OF  LIFE. 

Further,  the  constitution  of  our  consciousness  is  the 
ever  present  and  lasting  element  in  all  we  do  or  suffer; 
our  individuality  is  persistently  at  work,  more  or  less, 
at  every  moment  of  our  life :  all  other  influences  are 
temporal,  incidental,  fleeting,  and  subject  to  every 
kind  of  chance  and  change.  This  is  why  Aristotle 
says :  It  is  not  wealth  but  character  that  lasts.1  And 
just  for  the  same  reason  we  can  more  easily  bear  a 
misfortune  which  comes  to  us  entirely  from  without, 
than  one  which  we  have  drawn  upon  ourselves  ;  for 
fortune  may  always  change,  but  not  character. 
Therefore,  subjective  blessings, — a  noble  nature,  a 
capable  head,  a  joyful  temperament,  bright  spirits, 
a  well-constituted,  perfectly  sound  physique,  in  a 
word,  mens  sana  in  corpore  sano,  are  the  first  and 
most  important  elements  in  happiness ;  so  that  we 
should  be  more  intent  on  promoting  and  preserving 
such  qualities  than  on  the  possession  of  external  wealth 
and  external  honour. 

And  of  all  these,  the  one  which  makes  us  the  most 
directly  happy  is  a  genial  flow  of  good  spirits ;  for 
this  excellent  quality  is  its  own  immediate  reward. 
The  man  who  is  cheerful  and  merry  has  always  a  good 
reason  for  being  so, — the  fact,  namely,  that  he  is  so. 
There  is  nothing  which,  like  this  quality,  can  so  com- 
pletely replace  the  loss  of  every  other  blessing.  If 
you  know  anyone  who  is  young,  handsome,  rich  and 
esteemed,  and  you  want  to  know,  further,  if  he  is 
happy,  ask,  Is  he  cheerful  and  genial  ? — and  if  he  is, 

1  Etli.  Eud.,  vii.  2.  37  : — rj  yap  cfivcns  /3e/3ouov,  ov  rot 
■^p-q/xara. 


PERSONALITY,   OR  WHAT  A   MAN   IS.  17 

what  does  it  matter  whether  he  is  young  or  old, 
straight  or  humpbacked,  poor  or  rich  ? — he  is  happy. 
In  my  early  days  I  once  opened  an  old  book  and 
found  these  words  :  If  you  laugh  a  great  deal,  you  are 
happy ;  if  you  cry  a  great  deal,  you  are  unhappy  ; — 
a  very  simple  remark,  no  doubt ;  but  just  because  it 
is  so  simple  I  have  never  been  able  to  forget  it, 
even  though  it  is  in  the  last  degree  a  truism.  So  if 
cheerfulness  knocks  at  our  door,  we  should  throw  it 
wide  open,  for  it  never  comes  inopportunely.  Instead 
of  that,  we  often  make  scruples  about  letting  it  in. 
We  want  to  be  quite  sure  that  we  have  every  reason 
to  be  contented ;  then  we  are  afraid  that  cheerfulness  of 
spirits  may  interfere  with  serious  reflections  or  weighty 
cares.  Cheerfulness  is  a  direct  and  immediate  gain, 
— the  very  coin,  as  it  were,  of  happiness,  and  not,  like  all 
else,  merely  a  cheque  upon  the  bank ;  for  it  alone 
makes  us  immediately  happy  in  the  present  moment, 
and  that  is  the  highest  blessing  for  beings  like  us,  whose 
existence  is  but  an  infinitesimal  moment  between  two 
eternities.  To  secure  and  promote  this  feeling  of 
cheerfulness  should  be  the  supreme  aim  of  all  our 
endeavours  after  happiness. 

Now  it  is  certain  that  nothing  contributes  so  little 
to  cheerfulness  as  riches,  or  so  much,  as  health.  Is  it 
not  in  the  lower  classes,  the  so-called  working  classes, 
more  especially  those  of  them  who  live  in  the 
country,  that  we  see  cheerful  and  contented  faces? 
and  is  it  not  amongst  the  rich,  the  upper  classes,  that 
we  find  faces  full  of  ill-humour  and  vexation  ?  Con- 
sequently we  should  try  as  much  as  possible  to  main- 
tain a  high  degree  of  health  ;  for  cheerfulness  is  the 

B 


18  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

very  flower  of  it.  I  need  hardly  say  what  one  must 
do  to  be  healthy — avoid  every  kind  of  excess,  all 
violent  and  unpleasant  emotion,  all  mental  overstrain, 
take  daily  exercise  in  the  open  air,  cold  baths  and 
such  like  hygienic  measures.  For  without  a  proper 
amount  of  daily  exercise  no  one  can  remain  healthy  ; 
all  the  processes  of  life  demand  exercise  for  the  due 
performance  of  their  functions,  exercise  not  only  of 
the  parts  more  immediately  concerned,  but  also  of  the 
whole  body.  For,  as  Aristotle  rightly  says,  Life  is 
nnovement ;  it  is  its  very  essence.  Ceaseless  and  rapid 
motion  goes  on  in  every  part  of  the  organism.  The 
heart,  with  its  complicated  double  systole  and  diastole, 
beats  strongly  and  untiringly;  with  twenty-eight 
beats  it  has  to  drive  the  whole  of  the  blood  through 
arteries,  veins  and  capillaries ;  the  lungs  pump  like  a 
steam-engine,  without  intermission ;  the  intestines  are 
always  in  peristaltic  action ;  the  glands  are  all  con- 
stantly absorbing  and  secreting  ;  even  the  brain  has  a 
double  motion  of  its  own,  with  every  beat  of  the 
pulse  and  every  breath  we  draw.  When  people  can 
get  no  exercise  at  all,  as  is  the  case  with  the  countless 
numbers  who  are  condemned  to  a  sedentary  life,  there 
is  a  glaring  and  fatal  disproportion  between  outward 
inactivity  and  inner  tumult.  For  this  ceaseless  in- 
ternal motion  requires  some  external  counterpart,  and 
the  want  of  it  produces  effects  like  those  of  emotion 
which  we  are  obliged  to  suppress.  Even  trees  must 
be  shaken  by  the  wind,  if  they  are  to  thrive.  The 
rule  which  finds  its  application  here  may  be  most 
briefly  expressed  in  Latin  :  omnis  motus,  quo  celerior, 
eo  magis  motus, 


PERSONALITY,   OR  WHAT  A  MAN    IS.  19 

How  much  our  happiness  depends  upon  our  spirits, 
and  these  again  upon  our  state  of  health,  may  be 
seen  by  comparing  the  influence  which  the  same 
external  circumstances  or  events  have  upon  us  when 
we  are  well  and  strong  with  the  effect  which  they 
have  when  we  are  depressed  and  troubled  with  ill- 
health.  It  is  not  what  things  are  objectively  and  in 
themselves,  but  what  they  are  for  us,  in  our  way  of 
looking  at  them,  that  makes  us  happy  or  the  reverse. 
As  Epictetus  says,  Men  are  not  influenced  by  things 
but  by  their  thoughts  about  things.  And,  in  general, 
nine-tenths  of  our  happiness  depends  upon  health 
alone.  With  health,  everything  is  a  source  of  plea- 
sure ;  without  it,  nothing  else,  whatever  it  may  be, 
is  enjoyable  ;  even  the  other  personal  blessings, 
— a  great  mind,  a  happy  temperament — are  degraded 
and  dwarfed  for  want  of  it.  So  it  is  really  with 
good  reason  that,  when  two  people  meet,  the  first 
thing  they  do  is  to  inquire  after  each  other's  health, 
and  to  express  the  hope  that  it  is  good ;  for  good 
health  is  by  far  the  most  important  element  in  human 
happiness.  It  follows  from  all  this  that  the  greatest 
of  follies  is  to  sacrifice  health  for  any  other  kind 
of  happiness,  whatever  it  may  be,  for  gain,  advance- 
ment, learning  or  fame,  let  alone,  then,  for  fleeting 
sensual  pleasures.  Everything  else  should  rather  be 
postponed  to  it. 

But  however  much  health  may  contribute  to  that 
flow  of  good  spirits  which  is  so  essential  to  our 
happiness,  good  spirits  do  not  entirely  depend  upon 
health ;  for  a  man  may  be  perfectly  sound  in  his 
physique  and  still  possess  a  melancholy  temperament 


/ 


20  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

and  be  generally  given  up  to  sad  thoughts.  The 
ultimate  cause  of  this  is  undoubtedly  to  be  found  in 
innate,  &nd  therefore  unalterable,  physical  constitution, 
especially  in  the  more  or  less  normal  relation  of  a 
man's  sensitiveness  to  his  muscular  and  vital  ener<£y. 
J  **r  Abnormal  sensitiveness  produces  inequality  of  spirits,  a 
predominating  melancholy,  with  periodical  fits  of  un- 
I  \  restrained  liveliness.  A  genius  is  one  whose  nervous 
^  ^  poweror'  sensitiveness  is  largely  in  excess  ;  as  Aris- 
totle *  has  very  correctly  observed,  Men  distinguished 
in  philosophy,  politics,  poetry  or  art,  appear  to  be  all 
of  a  melancholy  temperament  This  is  doubtless  the 
passage  which  Cicero  has  in  his  mind  when  he  says, 
as  he  often  does,  Aristoteles  ait  omnes  ingeniosos 
melancholicos  esse.2  Shakespeare  has  very  neatly 
expressed  this  radical  and  innate  diversity  of  tempera- 
ment in  those  lines  in  The  Merchant  of  Venice : 

Nature  has  framed  strange  fellows  in  her  time  ; 
Some  that  will  evermore  peep  through  their  eyes, 
And  laugh,  like  parrots  at  a  hag-piper  ; 
And  others  of  such  vinegar  aspect, 
Tliat  they'll  not  show  their  teeth  in  way  of  smile, 
Tlwugh  Nestor  swear  the  jest  be  laughable. 

This  is  the  difference  which  Plato  draws  between 
cvkoXos  and  Bvo-koXos — the  man  of  easy,  and  the  man 
of  difficult  disposition — in  proof  of  which  he  refers 
to  the  varying  degrees  of  susceptibility  which  differ- 
ent people  show  to  pleasurable  and  painful  impres- 
sions; so  that  one  man  will  laugh  at  what  makes  another 
despair.  As  a  rule,  the  stronger  the  susceptibility  to  un- 
pleasant impressions, the  weaker  is  the  susceptibility  to 
1  Probl.  xxx,  ep.  1.  2  Tusc.  i.,  33. 


PERSONALITY,   OR  WHAT  A  MAN  IS.     -  21 

pleasant  ones,  and  vice  versa.  If  it  is  equally  possible 
for  an  event  to  turn  out  well  or  ill,  the  Svo-koAos  will 
be  annoyed  or  grieved  if  the  issue  is  unfavourable, 
and  will  not  rejoice,  should  it  be  happy.  On  the 
other  hand,  the  evKoAo?  will  neither  worry  nor  fret  over 
an  unfavourable  issue,  but  rejoice  if  it  turns  out  well. 
If  the  one  is  successful  in  nine  out  of  ten  undertak- 
ings, he  will  not  be  pleased,  but  rather  annoyed  that 
one  has  miscarried ;  whilst  the  other,  if  only  a  single 
one  succeeds,  will  manage  to  find  consolation  in  the 
fact  and  remain  cheerful.  But  here  is  another 
instance  of  the  truth,  that  hardly  any  evil  is  entirely 
without  its  compensation ;  for  the  misfortunes  and 
sufferings  which  the  Svo-koXol,  that  is,  people  of 
gloomy  and  anxious  character,  have  to  overcome,  are, 
on  the  whole,  more  imaginary  and  therefore  less  real 
than  those  which  befall  the  gay  and  careless ;  for  a 
man  who  paints  everything  black,  who  constantly 
fears  the  worst  and  takes  measures  accordingly,  will 
not  be  disappointed  so  often  in  this  world,  as  one  who 
always  looks  upon  the  bright  side  of  things.  And 
when  a  morbid  affection  of  the  nerves,  or  a  derange- 
ment of  the  digestive  organs,  plays  into  the  hand  of 
an  innate  tendency  to  gloom,  this  tendency  may 
reach  such  a  height  that  permanent  discomfort  pro- 
duces a  weariness  of  life.  So  arises  an  inclination  to 
suicide,  which  even  the  most  trivial  unpleasantness 
may  actually  bring  about ;  nay,  when  the  tendency 
attains  its  worst  form,  it  may  be  occasioned  by 
nothing  in  particular,  but  a  man  may  resolve  to  put 
an  end  to  his  existence,  simply  because  he  is  per- 
manently unhappy,  and  then  coolly  and  firmly  carry 


22  THE   WISDOii   OF   LIFE. 

out  his  determination ;  as  may  be  seen  by  the  way  in 
which  the  sufferer,  when  placed  under  supervision, 
as  he  usually  is,  eagerly  waits  to  seize  the  first 
unguarded  moment,  when,  without  a  shudder,  with- 
out a  struggle  or  recoil,  he  may  use  the  now  natural 
and  welcome  means  of  effecting  his  release.1  Even 
the  healthiest,  perhaps  even  the  most  cheerful  man, 
may  resolve  upon  death  under  certain  circumstances ; 
when,  for  instance,  his  sufferings,  or  his  fears  of  some 
inevitable  misfortune,  reach  such  a  pitch  as  to  out- 
weigh  the  terrors  of  death.  The  only  difference  lies 
in  the  degree  of  suffering  necessary  to  bring  about  the 
fatal  act,  a  degree  which  will  be  high  in  the  case  of  a 
cheerful,  and  low  in  that  of  a  gloomy  man.  The 
greater  the  melancholy,  the  lower  need  the  degree  be ; 
in  the  end,  it  may  even  sink  to  zero.  But  if  a  man 
is  cheerful,  and  his  spirits  are  supported  by  good 
health,  it  requires  a  high  degree  of  suffering  to  make 
him  lay  hands  upon  himself.  There  are  countless 
steps  in  the  scale  between  the  two  extremes  of  suicide, 
the  suicide  which  springs  merely  from  a  morbid 
intensification  of  innate  gloom,  and  the  suicide  of  the 
healthy  and  cheerful  man,  who  has  entirely  objective 
grounds  for  putting  an  end  to  his  existence. 

Beauty  is  partly  an  affair  of  health.  It  may  be 
reckoned  as  a  personal  advantage ;  though  it  does  not, 
properly  speaking,  contribute  directly  to  our  happi- 
ness. It  does  so  indirectly,  by  impressing  other 
people ;  and  it  is  no  unimportant  advantage,  even  in 
man.     Beauty  is  an  open   letter  of  recommendation, 

1  For  a  detailed  description  of  this  condition  of  mind  cf. 
Esquirol  Des  maladies  mentales. 


PERSONALITY,   OR   WHAT   A   MAN    IS.  23 

predisposing  the  heart  to  favour  the  person  who 
presents  it.  As  is  well  said  in  those  lines  of  Homer, 
the  gift  of  beauty  is  not  lightly  to  be  thrown  away, 
that  glorious  gift  which  none  can  bestow  save  the 
gods  alone — 

ovtol  aTTofSX-qT  Icrrt  deujv  ZpiKvSta  8(opa, 

ocrcra  Ktv  avrot  Scocriv,  Ikwv  S'ovk  av  ris  eAoiro.1 

The  most  general  survey  shows  us  that  the  two  foes 
of  human  happiness  are  pain  and  boredom.  We  may 
go  further,  and  say  that  in  the  degree  in  which  we 
are  fortunate  enough  to  get  away  from  the  one,  we 
approach  the  other.  Life  presents,  in  fact,  a  more  or 
less  violent  oscillation  between  the  two.  The  reason 
of  this  is  that  each  of  these  two  poles  stands  in  a 
double  antagonism  to  the  other,  external  or  objective, 
and  inner  or  subjective.  Needy  surroundings  and 
poverty  produce  pain ;  while,  if  a  man  is  more  than 
well  off,  he  is  bored.  Accordingly,  while  the  lower 
classes  are  engaged  in  a  ceaseless  struggle  with  need, 
in  other  words,  with  pain,  the  upper  carry  on  a  con- 
stant and  often  desperate  battle  with  boredom.2  The 
inner  or  subjective  antagonism  arises  from  the  fact 
that,  in  the  individual,  susceptibility  to  pain  varies 
inversely  with  susceptibility  to  boredom,  because  sus- 
ceptibility is  directly  proportionate  to  mental  power. 
Let  me  explain.  A  dull  mind  is,  as  a  rule  associated 
with  dull  sensibilities,  nerves  which  no  stimulus  can 

i  Iliad  3,  65. 

2  And  the  extremes  meet ;  for  the  lowest  state  of  civilization, 
a  nomad  or  wandering  life,  finds  its  counterpart  in  the  highest, 
v  where  everyone  is  at  times  a  tourist.  The  earlier  stage  was  a 
case  of  necessity  ;  the  latter  is  a  remedy  for  boredom. 


\ 


24  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

affect,  a  temperament,  in  short,  which  does  not  feel 
pain  or  anxiety  very  much,  however  great  or  terrible 
it   may    be.      Now,   intellectual    dulness   is    at    the 
bottom  of  that  vacuity  of  soul  which  is  stamped   on 
so  many  faces,  a  state  of  mind  which  betrays  itself  by 
v    a  constant  and  lively  attention  to  all  the  trivial  cir- 
cumstances in  the  external  world.     This  is  the  true 
i  source  of  boredom — a  continual  panting  after  excite- 
ment, in  order  to  have  a  pretext  for  giving  the  mind 
and   spirits  something  to  occupy  them.      The   kind 
of  things  people  choose  for  this  purpose  shows  that 
they  are  not  very  particular,  as  witness  the  miserable 
pastimes  they  have  recourse  to,  and  their  ideas  of 
social  pleasure  and  conversation ;  or  again,  the  number 
of  people  wTho  gossip  on  the  doorstep  or  gape  out  of 
the   window.      It   is   mainly   because   of   this   inner 
vacuity  of  soul  that  people  go  in  quest  of  society, 
diversion,  amusement,   luxury  of  every  sort,  which 
lead  many  to  extravagance  and  misery.     Nothing  is 
so  good  a  protection  against  such  misery  as  inward 
wealth,  the  wealth  of  the  mind,  because  the  greater  it 
grows,  the  less  room  it  leaves  for  boredom.     The  in- 
exhaustible activity   of  thought!   finding  ever   new 
material  to  work  upon  in  the  multifarious  phenomena 
of  self  and  nature,  and  able  and  ready  to  form  new 
combinations   of  them, — there   you  have   something 
that  invigorates  the  mind,  and  apart  from  moments  of 
relaxation,  sets  it  far  above  the  reach  of  boredom. 

But,  on  the  other  hand,  this  high  degree  of  intelli- 
gence is  rooted  in  a  high  degree  of  susceptibility, 
greater  strength  of  will,  greater  passionateness  ;  and 
from  the  union  of  these  qualities  comes  an  increased 


PERSONALITY,   OR  WHAT  A   MAN  IS.  25 

capacity  for  emotion,  an  enhanced  sensibility  to  all 
mental  and  even  bodily  pain,  greater  impatience  of 
obstacles,  greater  resentment  of  interruption ; — all  of 
which  tendencies  are  augmented  by  the  power  of  the 
imagination,  the  vivid  character  of  the  whole  range 
of  thought,  including  what  is  disagreeable.  This 
applies,  in  varying  degrees,  to  every  step  in  the  long 
scale  of  mental  power,  from  the  veriest  dunce  to  the 
greatest  genius  that  ever  lived.  Therefore  the  nearer 
anj^one  is,  either  from  a  subjective  or  from  an  objec- 
tive point  of  view,  to  one  of  these  sources  of  suffering 
in  human  life,  the  farther  he  is  from  the  other.  And 
so  a  man's  natural  bent  will  lead  him  to  make  his 
objective  world  conform  to  his  subjective  as  much  as 
possible;  that  is  to  say,  he  will  take  the  greatest 
measures  against  that  form  of  suffering  to  which  he  is 
most  liable.  The  wise  man  will,  above  all,  strive  after 
freedom  from  pain  and  annoyance,  quiet  and  leisure, 
consequently  a  tranquil,  modest  life,  with  as  few  en- 
counters as  may  be  ;  and  so,  after  a  little  experience 
of  his  so-called  fellow-men,  he  will  elect  to  live  in 
retirement,  or  even,  if  he  is  a  man  of  great  intellect, 
in  solitude.  For  the  more  a  man  has  in  himself,  the 
less  he  will  want  from  other  people, — the  less,  indeed, 
other  people  can  be  to  him.  This  is  why  a  high 
degree  of  intellect  tends  to  make  a  man  unsocial. 
True,  if  quality  of  intellect  could  be  made  up  for  by 
quantity,  it  might  be  worth  while  to  live  even  in  the 
great  world ;  but,  unfortunately,  a  hundred  fools 
together  will  not  make  one  wise  man. 

But  the  individual  who  stands  at  the  other  end  of 
the  scale  is  no  sooner  free  from  the  pangs  of  need 


26  -  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

than  he  endeavours  to  get  pastime  and  society  at  any 
cost,  taking  up  with  the  first  person  he  meets,  and 
avoiding  nothing  so  much  as  himself.     For  in  solitude, 
where  every  one  is  thrown  upon  his  own  resources, 
what  a  man  has  in  himself  comes  to  light :  the  fool  in 
fine  raiment  groans  under  the  burden  of  his  miserable 
personality,  a  burden  which  he  can  never  throw  off, 
whilst  the  man  of  talent  peoples  the  waste  places  with 
his  animating  thoughts.     Seneca  declares  that  folly  is 
its  own  burden, — omnis  stultitia  labor  at  fastidio  sui, 
— a  very  true  saying,  with  which  may  be  compared 
theavords  of  Jesus,  the  son  of  Sirach,  The  life  of  a  fool 
is  worse  than  death.1     And,  as  a  rule,  it  will  be  found 
that  a  man  is  sociable  just  in  the  degree  in  which  he 
is  intellectually  poor  and  generally  vulgar.     For  one's 
choice  in  this  world  does  not  go  much  beyond  solitude 
on  one  side  and  vulgarity  on  the  other.     It  is  said 
that  the  most  sociable  of  all  people  are  the  negroes ;] 
and  they  are  at  the  bottom  of  the  scale  in  intellect. 
I  remember  reading  once  in  a  French  paper  2  that  the 
blacks  in  North  America,  whether  free  or  enslaved, 
are  fond  of  shutting  themselves  up  in  large  numbers 
in  the  smallest  space,  because  they  cannot  have  too 
much  of  one  another's  snub-nosed  company. 

The  brain  may  be  regarded  as  a  kind  of  parasite  of 
the  organism,  a  pensioner,  as  it  were,  who  dwells  with 
the  body :  and  leisure,  that  is,  the  time  one  has  for 
the  free  enjoyment  of  one's  consciousness  or  indi- 
viduality, is  the  fruit  or  produce  of  the  rest  of  exist- 
ence, which  is  in  general  only  labour  and  effort.     But 

1  Ecclesiasfcicus,  xxii.  11. 

2  Le  Commerce,  Oct.  19th,  1837. 


-~    PERSONALITY,   OR   WHAT   A   MAN   IS.  27 

what  does  most  people's  leisure  yield  ? — boredom  and 
dulness ;  except,  of  course,  when  it  is  occupied  with 
sensual  pleasure  or  folly.  How  little  such  leisure  is 
worth  may  be  seen  in  the  way  in  which  it  is  spent : 
and,  as  Ariosto  observes,  how  miserable  are  the  idle 
hours  of  ignorant  men  ! — ozio  lungo  d'uomini  ignor- 
anti.  Ordinary  people  think  merely  how  they  shall 
spend  their  time  ;  a  man  of  any  talent  tries  to  use  it. 
The  reason  why  people  of  limited  intellect  are  apt  to 
be  bored  is  that  their  intellect  is  absolutely  nothing 
more  than  the  means  by  which  the  motive  power  of 
the  will  is  put  into  force  •  and  whenever  there  is 
nothing  particular  to  set  the  will  in  motion,  it  rests, 
and  their  intellect  takes  a  holiday,  because,  equally 
with  the  will,  it  requires  something  external  to  bring 
it  into  play.  The  result  is  an  awful  stagnation  of 
whatever  power  a  man  has — in  a  word,  boredom.  To 
counteract  this  miserable  feeling,  men  run  to  triviali- 
ties which  please  for  the  moment  they  are  taken  up, 
hoping  thus  to  engage  the  will  in  order  to  rouse  it  to 
action,  and  so  set  the  intellect  in  motion  ;  for  it  is  the 
latter  which  has  to  give  effect  to  these  motives  of  the 
will.  Compared  with  real  and  natural  motives,  these 
are  but  as  paper  money  to  coin ;  for  their  value  is 
only  arbitrary — card  games  and  the  like,  which  have 
been  invented  for  this  very  purpose.  And  if  there  is 
nothing  else  to  be  done,  a  man  will  twirl  his  thumbs 
or  beat  the  devil's  tattoo ;  or  a  cigar  may  be  a  wel- 
come substitute  for  exercising  his  brains.  Hence,  in 
all  countries  the  chief  occupation  of  society  is  card- 
playing,1  and  it  is  the  gauge  of  its  value,  and  an  out- 
1  Translator's  Note. — Card-playing  to  this  extent  is  now,  no 


28  THE  WISDOM   OF  LIFE. 

ward  sign  that  it  is  bankrupt  in  thought.  Because 
people  have  no  thoughts  to  deal  in,  they  deal  cards, 
and  try  and  win  one  another's  money.  Idiots  !  But 
I  do  not  wish  to  be  unjust ;  so  let  me  remark  that  it 
may  certainly  be  said  in  defence  of  card-playing  that 
it  is  a  preparation  for  the  world  and  for  business  life, 
because  one  learns  thereby  how  to  make  a  clever  use 
of  fortuitous  but  unalterable  circumstances,  (cards,  m 
this  case),  and  to  get  as  much  out  of  them  as  one  can : 
and  to  do  this  a  man  must  learn  a  little  dissimulation, 
and  how  to  put  a  good  face  upon  a  bad  business.  But, 
on  the  other  hand,  it  is  exactly  for  this  reason  that 
card-playing  is  so  demoralising,  since  the  whole  object 
of  it  is  to  employ  every  kind  of  trick  and  machination 
in  order  to  win  what  belongs  to  another.  And  a 
habit  of  this  sort,  learnt  at  the  card-table,  strikes  root 
and  pushes  its  way  into  practical  life ;  and  in  the 
affairs  of  every  day  a  man  gradually  comes  to  regard 
meum  and  tuum  in  much  the  same  light  as  cards,  and 
to  consider  that  he  may  use  to  the  utmost  whatever 
advantages  he  possesses,  so  long  as  he  does  not  come 
within  the  arm  of  the  law.  Examples  of  what  I  mean 
are  of  daily  occurrence  in  mercantile  life.  Since, 
then,  leisure  is  the  flower,  or  rather  the  fruit,  of  ex- 
istence, as  it  puts  a  man  into  possession  of  himself, 
those  are  happy  indeed  who  possess  something  real  in 
themselves.  But  what  do  you  get  from  most  people's 
leisure  ? — only  a  good-for-nothing  fellow,  who  is  ter- 
ribly bored  and  a  burden  to  himself.  Let  us,  there- 
doubt,  a  thing  of  the  past,  at  any  rate  amongst  the  nations  of 
northern  Europe.  The  present  fashion  is  rather  in  favour  of  a 
dilettante  interest  in  art  or  literature. 
Nfl^-t      wt      *****     TV/ 


PERSONALITY,   OR  WHAT  A  MAN   IS.  29 

fore,  rejoice,  dear  brethren,  for  we  are  not  children  of 
the  bondwoman,  but  of  the  free. 

Further,  as  no  land  is  so  well  off  as  that  which  re- 
quires few  imports,  or  none  at  all,  so  the  happiest  man 
is  one  who  has  enough  in  his  own  inner  wealth,  and 
asks  little  or  nothing  from  outside  for  his  maintenance. 
For  imports  are  expensive  things,  reveal  dependence,  en- 
tail danger,  occasion  trouble,  and,  when  all  is  said  and 
done,  are  a  poor  substitute  for  home  produce.  No 
man  ought  to  expect  much  from  others,  or,  in  general, 
from  the  external  world.  What  one  human  being 
can  be  to  another  is  not  a  very  great  deal :  in  the  end 
every  one  stands  alone,  and  the  important  thing  is 
who  it  is  that  stands  alone.  Here,  then,  is  another 
application  of  the  general  truth  which  Goethe  recog- 
nises in  Dichtung  und  Wahrheit  (Bk.  III.),  that  in 
everything  a  man  has  ultimately  to  appeal  to  himself; 
or,  as  Goldsmith  puts  it  in  The  Traveller : 

Still  to  ourselves  in  every  place  consigned 
Our  own  felicity  we  make  or  find. 

Himself  is  the  source  of  the  best  and  most  a  man 
can  be  or  achieve.  The  more  this  is  so — the  more  a 
man  finds  his  sources  of  pleasure  in  himself — the 
happier  he  will  be.  Therefore,  it  is  with  great  truth 
that  Aristotle1  says,  To  be  happy  means  to  be  self-  — - 
sufficient.  For  all  other  sources  of  happiness  are  in 
their  nature  most  uncertain,  precarious,  fleeting,  the 
sport  of  chance  ;  and  so  even  under  the  most  favour- 
able circumstances  they  can  easily  bo  exhausted  ;  nay, 
this  is  unavoidable,  because  they  are  not  always 
1  Eth.  Eud.,  vii.  2. 


30  THE  WISDOM   OF  LIFE,      a 

'  P 

within  reach.  And  in  old  age  tliese  sources  of  happi- 
ness most  necessarily  dry  up  : — love  leaves  us  then, 
and  wit,  desire  to  travel,  delight  in  horses,  aptitude 
for  social  intercourse ;  friends  and  relations,  too,  are 
taken  from  us  by  death.  Then  more  than  ever,  it 
depends  upon  what  a  man  has  in  himself ;  for  this 
will  stick  to  him  longest ;  and  at  any  period  of  life  it 
it  is  the  only  genuine  and  lasting  source  of  happiness. 
There  is  not  much  to  be  got  anywhere  in  the  world. 
It  is  filled  with  misery  and  pain ;  and  if  a  man 
escapes  these,  boredom  lies  in  wait  for  him  at  every 
corner.  Nay  more  ;  it  is  evil  which  generally  has  the 
upper  hand,  and  folly  makes  the  most  noise.  Fate  is 
cruel,  and  mankind  pitiable.  In  such  a  world  as  this, 
a  man  who  is  rich  in  himself  is  like  a  bright,  warm, 
happy  room  at  Christmas  tide,  while  without  are 
the  frost  and  snow  of  a  December  night.  Therefore, 
without  doubt,  the  happiest  destiny  on  earth  is  to 
have  the  rare  gift  of  a  rich  individuality,  and,  more 
especially,  to  be  possessed  of  a  good  endowment 
of  intellect;  this  is  the  happiest  destiny,  though  it 
may  not  be,  after  all,  a  very  brilliant  one.  There  was 
great  wisdom  in  that  remark  which  Queen  Christina 
of  Sweden  made,  in  her  nineteenth  year,  about 
Descartes,  who  had  then  lived  for  twenty  years  in 
the  deepest  solitude  in  Holland,  and,  apart  from 
report,  was  known  to  her  only  by  a  single  essay :  M. 
Descartes,  she  said,  is  the  happiest  of  men,  and  his  con- 
dition seems  to  me  much  to  be  envied.1  Of  course,  as 
was  the  case  with  Descartes,  external  circumstances 
must  be  favourable  enough  to  allow  a  man  to  be 
1  Vie  de  Descartes,  par  Baillet.    Li  v.  vii.,  ch.  10, 


PERSONALITY,   OR  WHAT  A  MAN   IS.  31 

master  of  his  life  and  happiness ;  or,  as  we  read  in 
Fcclesiastes,1 — Wisdom  is  good  together  with  an  inheri- 
tance, and  profitable  unto  them  that  see  the  sun.  The 
man  to  whom  nature  and  fate  have  granted  the 
blessing  of  wisdom,  will  be  most  anxious  and  careful 
to  keep  open  the  fountains  of  happiness  which  he  has 
in  himself  ;  and  for  this,  independence  and  leisure  are 
necessary.  To  obtain  them,  he  will  be  willing  to 
moderate  his  desires  and  harbour  his  resources;  all  the 
more  because  he  is  not,  like  others,  restricted  to 
the  external  world  for  his  pleasures.  So  he  will  not 
be  misled  by  expectations  of  office,  or  money,  or 
the  favour  and  applause  of  his  fellow-men,  into  sur- 
rendering himself  in  order  to  conform  to  low  desires 
and  vulgar  tastes ;  nay,  in  such  a  case  he  will  follow 
the  advice  that  Horace  gives  in  his  epistle  to 
Maecenas.2  It  is  a  great  piece  of  folly  to  sacrifice  the 
inner  for  the  outer  man,  to  give  the  whole  or  the 
greater  part  of  one's  quiet  leisure  and  independence 
for  splendour,  rank,  pomp,  titles  and  honour.  This  is 
what  Goethe  did.  My  good  luck  drew  me  quite  in 
the  other  direction. 

The  truth  which  I  am  insisting  upon  here,  the 
truth,  namely,  that  the  chief  source  of  human  happi- 
ness is  internal,  is  confirmed  by  that  most  accurate 
observation  of  Aristotle  in  the  Nichomachean  Ethics? 
that  every  pleasure  presupposes  some  sort  of  activity, 

i  vii.  12. 

2  Lib.  1.,  ep.  7. 

Nee  somnum  plebis  laudo,  satur  altilnim,  nee 
Otia  divitiis  Arabum  Uberrima  muto, 

3  i.  7  and  vii,  13,  14, 


32  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

the  application  of  some  sort  of  power,  without  which 
it  cannot  exist.  The  doctrine  of  Aristotle's,  that  a 
man's  happiness  consists  in  the  free  exercise  of  his 
highest  faculties,  is  also  enunciated  by  Stobasus  in  his 
exposition  of  the  Peripatetic  philosophy1 :  Happiness, 
\  he  says,  means  vigorous  and  successful  activity  in  all 
your  undertakings;  and  he  explains  that  by  vigour 
(apkrrj)  he  means  mastery  in  any  thing,  whatever  it  be. 
Now,  the  original  purpose  of  those  forces  with  which 
nature  has  endowed  man  is  to  enable  him  to  struggle 
against  the  difficulties  which  beset  him  on  all  sides. 
But  if  this  struggle  comes  to  an  end,  his  unemployed 
forces  become  a  burden  to  him ;  and  he  has  to  set  to 
work  and  play  with  them, — use  them,  I  mean,  for  no 
purpose  at  all,  beyond  avoiding  the  other  source  oi 
human  suffering,  boredom,  to  which  he  is  at  once  ex- 
posed. It  is  the  upper  classes,  people  of  wealth,  who 
are  the  greatest  victims  of  boredom.  Lucretius  long 
ago  described  their  miserable  state,  and  the  truth  of 
his  description  may  be  still  recognised  to-day  in  the 
life  of  every  great  capital — where  the  rich  man  is 
seldom  in  his  own  halls,  because  it  bores  him  to  be 
there,  and  still  he  returns  thither,  because  he  is  no 
better  off  outside ; — or  else  he  is  away  in  post- 
haste to  his  house  in  the  country,  as  if  it  were  on  fire ; 
and  he  is  no  sooner  arrived  there,  than  he  is  bored 
again,  and  seeks  to  forget  everything  in  sleep,  or  else 
hurries  back  to  town  once  more. 

Exit  saepeforas  magnis  ex  cedibus  ille, 

Esse  domi  quern  pertaesum  est,  subitoque  reventat ; 

Quippe  foris  nihilo  melius  qui  sentiat  esse. 

1  Eel.  eth.  ii.,  ch.  7. 


PERSONALITY,   OR  WHAT  A  MAX   IS.  S3 

Currit,  agens  mannos,  ad  villam  precijntanter, 
Auxilium  tectis  quasi  ferre  ardentibus  instans : 
Oscitat  extemplo,  tetigit  quum  lirnhia  villac  ; 
Aut  abit  in  somnum  gravis,  atque  oblivia  quaerit ; 
Aut  etiam  properans  urbem  petit  atque  revisit.1 

In  their  youth,  such  people  must  have  had  a  super- 
fluity of  muscular  and  vital  energy, — powers  which, 
unlike  those  of  the  mind,  cannot  maintain  their  full 
degree  of  vigour  very  long ;  and  in  later  years  they 
either  have  no  mental  powers  at  all,  or  cannot  develope 
any  for  want  of  employment  which  would  bring  them 
into  play ;  so  that  they  are  in  a  wretched  plight. 
Will,  however,  they  still  possess,  for  this  isjthe  only 
power  that  is  inexhaustible  ;  and  they  try  to  stimulate 
their  will  by  passionate  excitement,  such  as  games  of 
chance  for  high  stakes — undoubtedly  a  most  degrading 
form  of  vice.  And  one  may  say  generally  that  if  a 
man  finds  himself  with  nothing  to  do,  he  is  sure  to 
choose  some  amusement  suited  to  the  kind  of  power 
in  which  he  excels, — bowls,  it  may  be,  or  chess ;  hunt- 
ing or  painting ;  horse-racing  or  music ;  cards,  or 
poetry,  heraldry,  philosophy,  or  some  other  dilettante 
interest.  We  might  classify  these  interests  methodi- 
cally, by  reducing  them  to  expressions  of  the  three 
fundamental  powers,  the  factors,  that  is  to  say,  which  go 
to  make  up  the  physiological  constitution  of  man  ;  and 
further,  by  considering  these  powers  by  themselves, 
and  apart  from  any  of  the  definite  aims  which  they 
may  subserve,  and  simply  as  affording  three  sources 
of  possible  pleasure,  out  of  which  every  man  will 
choose  what  suits  him,  according  as  he  excels  in  one 

direction  or  another. 

1  III.  1073. 

D 


34  THE  WISDOM  OF   LIFE. 

First  of  all  come   the   pleasures   of  vital  energy, 
of  food,  drink,  digestion,  rest  and  sleep  ;  and  there  are 
parts  of  the  world  where  it  can  be  said  that  these  are 
characteristic  and  national  pleasures.     Secondly,  there 
are  the  pleasures  of  muscular  energy,  such  as  walking, 
running,  wrestling,  dancing,  fencing,  riding  and  similar 
athletic  pursuits,  which  sometimes  take  the  form  of 
sport,  and  sometimes  of  a  military  life  and  real  war- 
fare.    Thirdly,  there  are  the  pleasures  of  sensibility, 
such  as  observation,  thought,  feeling,  or  a  taste  for 
poetry  or  culture,  music,  learning,  reading,  meditation, 
invention,  philosophy  and  the  like.     As  regards  the 
value,  relative  worth  and  duration  of  each  of  these 
kinds  of  pleasure,  a  great  deal  might  be  said,  which, 
however,  I  leave  the  reader  to  supply.     But  every  one 
will  see  that  the  nobler  the  power  which  is  brought 
into  play,  the  greater  will  be  the  pleasure  which  it 
gives ;  for  pleasure  always  involves  the  use  of  one's 
own  powers,   and  happiness   consists   in   a   frequent 
repetition  of  pleasure.     No  one  will  deny  that  in  this 
respect  the  pleasures  of  sensibility  occupy  a  higher 
place  than  either  of  the  other  two  fundamental  kinds; 
which  exist  in  an  equal,  nay,  in  a  greater  degree  in 
brutes  ;  it  is  his  preponderating  amount  of  sensibility 
which  distinguishes  man  from  other  animals.     Now, 
our  mental  powers  are  forms  of  sensibility,  and  there- 
fore a  preponderating  amount  of  it  makes  us  capable 
of  that  kind  of  pleasure  which  has  to  do  with  mind, 
so-called  intellectual  pleasure;    and  the  more  sensi- 
bility predominates,  the  greater  the  pleasure  will  be.1 

1  Nature  exhibits  a  continual   progress,  starting  from    the 
mechanical  and  chemical  activity  of  the  inorganic  world,  pro- 


PERSONALITY,   OR   WHAT  A  MAN   IS.  35 

The  normal,  ordinary  man  takes  a  vivid  interest  in 
anything  only  in  so  far  as  it  excites  his  will,  that  is 
to  say,  is  a  matter  of  personal  interest  to  him.     But 

ceeding  to  the  vegetable,  with  its  dull  enjoyment  of  self,  from 
that  to  the  animal  world,  where  intelligence  and  consciousness 
begin,  at  first  very  weak,  and  only  after  many  intermediate 
stages  ^attaining  its  last  great  development  in  man,  whose 
intellect  is  Nature's  crowning  point,  the  goal  of  all  her  efforts, 
the  most  perfect  and  difficult  of  all  her  works.  And  even 
within  the  range  of  the  human  intellect,  there  are  a  great  many 
observable  differences  of  degree,  and  it  is  very  seldom  that 
intellect  reaches  its  highest  point,  intelligence  properly  so-called, 
which  in  this  narrow  and  strict  sense  of  the  word,  is  Nature's  most 
consummate  product,  and  so  the  rarest  and  most  precious  thing 
of  which  the  world  can  boast.  The  highest  product  of  Nature 
is  the  clearest  degree  of  consciousness,  in  which  the  world 
mirrors  itself  more  plainly  and  completely  than  anywhere  else. 
A  man  endowed  with  this  form  of  intelligence  is  in  possession  of 
what  is  noblest  and  best  on  earth ;  and  accordingly,  he  has  a 
source  of  pleasure  in  comparison  with  which  all  others  are 
small.  From  his  surroundings  he  asks  nothing  but  leisure  for 
the  free  enjoyment  of  what  he  has  got,  time,  as  it  were,  to 
polish  his  diamond.  All  other  pleasures  that  are  not  of  the 
intellect  are  of  a  lower  kind  ;  for  they  are,  one  and  all,  move- 
ments of  will — desires,  hopes,  fears  and  ambitions,  no  matter  to 
what  directed  :  they  are  always  satisfied  at  the  cost  of  pain,  and 
in  the  case  of  ambition,  generally  with  more  or  less  of  illusion. 
With  intellectual  pleasure,  on  the  other  hand,  truth  becomes 
clearer  and  clearer.  In  the  realm  of  intelligence  pain  has  no 
power.  Knowledge  is  all  in  all.  Further,  intellectual  pleasures 
are  accessible  entirely  and  only  through  the  medium  of  the  in- 
telligence, and  are  limited  by  its  capacity.  For  aU  the  wit  there 
is  in  the  world  is  useless  to  him  who  has  none.  Still  this  advan- 
tage is  accompanied  by  a  substantial  disadvantage;  for  the 
whole  of  Nature  shows  that  with  the  growth  of  intelligence 
comes  increased  capacity  for  pain,  and  it  is  only  with  the  highest 
degree  of  intelligence  that  suffering  reaches  its  supreme  point. 


36  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

constant  excitement  of  the  will  is  never  an  unmixed 
good,  to  say  the  least ;  in  other  words,  it  involves 
pain.  Card -playing,  that  universal  occupation  of 
"  good  society  "  everywhere,  is  a  device  for  providing 
this  kind  of  excitement,  and  that,  too,  by  means  of 
interests  so  small  as  to  produce  slight  and  momen- 
tary, instead  of  real  and  permanent,  pain.  Card-play- 
ing is,  in  fact,  a  mere  tickling  of  the  will.1 

On  the  other  hand,  a  man  of  powerful  intellect  is 
capable  of  taking  a  vivid  interest  in  things  in  the 
way  of  mere  knowledge,  with  no  admixture  of  will ; 
nay,  such  an  interest  is  a  necessity  to  him.  It  places 
him  in  a  sphere  where  pain  is  an  alien,  a  diviner  air 
where  the  gods  live  serene: — 

1  Vulgarity  is,  at  bottom,  the  kind  of  consciousness  in  which 
the  will  completely  predominates  over  the  intellect,  where  the 
latter  does  nothing  more  than  perform  the  service  of  its  master, 
the  will.  Therefore,  when  the  will  makes  no  demands,  supplies 
no  motives,  strong  or  weak,  the  intellect  entirely  loses  its  power, 
and  the  result  is  complete  vacancy  of  mind.  Now  will  without 
intellect  is  the  most  vulgar  and  common  thing  in  the  world, 
possessed  by  every  blockhead,  who,  in  the  gratification  of  his 
passions,  shows  the  stuff  of  which  he  is  made.  This  is  the  con- 
dition of  mind  called  vulgarity,  in  which  the  only  active  elements 
are  the  organs  of  sense,  and  that  small  amount  of  intellect 
which  is  necessary  for  apprehending  the  data  of  sense.  Accord- 
ingly, the  vulgar  man  is  constantly  open  to  all  sorts  of  impres- 
sions, and  immediately  perceives  all  the  little  trifling  things 
that  go  on  in  his  environment :  the  lightest  whisper,  the  most 
trivial  circumstance,  is  sufficient  to  rouse  his  attention  ;  he  is 
just  like  an  animal.  Such  a  man's  mental  condition  reveals 
itself  in  his  face,  in  his  whole  exterior  ;  and  hence  that  vulgar, 
repulsive  appearance,  which  is  all  the  more  offensive,  if,  as  ia 
usually  the  case,  his  will — the  only  factor  in  his  consciousness — 
is  a  base,  selfish  and  altogether  bad  one. 


PERSONALITY,   OR  WHAT  A  MAN   IS.  37 

6eol  pela  ^wovTe?.1 

Look  on  these  two  pictures — the  life  of  the  masses, 
one  long,  dull  record  of  struggle  and  effort  entirely 
devoted  to  the  petty  interests  of  personal  welfare,  to 
misery  in  all  its  forms,  a  life  beset  by  intolerable 
boredom  as  soon  as  ever  those  aims  are  satisfied  and 
the  man  is  thrown  back  upon  himself,  whence  he  can 
be  roused  again  to  some  sort  of  movement  only  by 
the  wild  fire  of  passion.  On  the  other  side  you  have 
a  man  endowed  with  a  high  degree  of  mental  power, 
leading  an  existence  rich  in  thought  and  full  of  life 
and  meaning,  occupied  by  worthy  and  interesting 
objects  as  soon  as  ever  he  is  free  to  give  himself  to 
them,  bearing  in  himself  a  source  of  the  noblest  plea- 
sure. What  external  promptings  he  wants  come  from 
the  works  of  nature,  and  from  the  contemplation  of 
human  affairs  and  the  achievements  of  the  great  of  all 
ages  and  countries,  which  are  thoroughly  appreciated 
by  a  man  of  this  type  alone,  as  being  the  only  one 
who  can  quite  understand  and  feel  with  them.  And 
so  it  is  for  him  alone  that  those  great  ones  have  really 
lived ;  it  is  to  him  that  they  make  their  appeal ;  the 
rest  are  but  casual  hearers  who  only  half  understand 
either  them  or  their  followers.  Of  course,  this  char- 
acteristic of  the  intellectual  man  implies  that  he  has 
one  more  need  than  the  others,  the  need  of  reading, 
observing,  studying,  meditating,  practising,  the  need, 
in  short,  of  undisturbed  leisure.  For,  as  Voltaire  has 
very  rightly  said,  there  are  no  real  pleasures  without 
real  needs ;  and  the  need  of  them  is  why  to  such  a 

1  Odyssey  IV.,  805. 


38  THE  WISDOM   OF  LIFE. 

man  pleasures  are  accessible  which  are  denied  to  others, 
— the  varied  beauties  of  nature  and  art  and  literature. 
To  heap  these  round  people  who  do  not  want  them 
and  cannot  appreciate  them,  is  like  expecting  grey- 
hairs  to  fall  in  love.  A  man  who  is  privileged  in  this 
respect  leads  two  lives,  a  personal  and  an  intellectual, 
life;  and  the  latter  gradually  comes  to  be  looked  upon 
as  the  true  one,  and  the  former  as  merely  a  means  to 
it.  Other  people  make  this  shallow,  empty  and 
troubled  existence  an  end  in  itself.  To  the  life  of  the 
intellect  such  a  man  will  give  the  preference  over  all 
his  other  occupations  :  by  the  constant  growth  of  in- 
sight and  knowledge,  this  intellectual  life,  like  a 
slowly-forming  work  of  art,  will  acquire  a  consistency, 
a  permanent  intensity,  a  unity  which  becomes  ever 
more  and  more  complete  ;  compared  with  which,  a 
life  devoted  to  the  attainment  of  personal  comfort, 
a  life  that  may  broaden  indeed,  but  can  never  be 
deepened,  makes  but  a  poor  show  :  and  yet,  as  I  have 
said,  people  make  this  baser  sort  of  existence  an  end 
in  itself. 

The  ordinary  life  of  every  day,  so  far  as  it  is  not 
moved  by  passion,  is  tedious  and  insipid ;  and  if  it  is 
so  moved,  it  soon  becomes  painful.  Those  alone  are 
happy  whom  nature  has  favoured  with  some  super- 
fluity of  intellect,  something  beyond  what  is  just 
necessary  to  carry  out  the  behests  of  their  will;  for  it 
enables  them  to  lead  an  intellectual  life  as  well,  a  life 
unattended  by  pain  and  full  of  vivid  interests.  Mere 
leisure,  that  is  to  say,  intellect  unoccupied  in  the  ser- 
vice of  the  will,  is  not  of  itself  sufficient :  there  must 
tie  a  real  superfluity  of  power,  set  free  from  the  ser- 


PERSONALITY,   OR  WHAT  A  MAN  IS.  39 

vice  of  the  will  and  devoted  to  that  of  the  intellect ; 
for,  as  Seneca  says,  otium  sine  litteris  mors  est  et  vivi 
hominis  sepultura — illiterate  leisure  is  a  form  of 
death,  a  living  tomb.  Varying  with  the  amount  of 
the  superfluity,  there  will  be  countless  developments 
in  this  second  life,  the  life  of  the  mind ;  it  may  be  the 
mere  collection  and  labelling  of  insects,  birds,  minerals, 
coins,  or  the  highest  achievements  of  poetry  and  phil- 
osophy. The  life  of  the  mind  is  not  only  a  protection 
against  boredom,  it  also  wards  off  the  pernicious  effects 
of  boredom  ;  it  keeps  us  from  bad  company,  from  the 
many  dangers,  misfortunes,  losses  and  extravagances 
which  the  man  who  places  his  happiness  entirely  in 
the  objective  world  is  sure  to  encounter.  My  phil- 
osophy, for  instance,  has  never  brought  me  in  a  six- 
pence ;  but  it  has  spared  me  many  an  expense. 

The  ordinary  man  places  his  life's  happiness  in 
things  external  to  him,  in  property,  rank,  wife  and 
children,  friends,  society,  and  the  like,  so  that  when 
he  loses  them  or  finds  them  disappointing,  the  founda- 
tion of  his  happiness  is  destroyed.  In  other  words, 
his  centre  of  gravity  is  not  in  himself;  it  is  constantly 
changing  its  place,  with  every  wish  and  whim.  If  he 
is  a  man  of  means,  one  day  it  will  be  his  house  in  the 
country,  another  buying  horses,  or  entertaining  friends, 
or  travelling, — a  life,  in  short,  of  general  luxury,  the 
reason  being  that  he  seeks  his  pleasure  in  things  out- 
side him.  Like  one  whose  health  and  strength  are 
gone,  he  tries  to  regain  by  the  use  of  jellies  and  drugs, 
instead  of  by  developing  his  own  vital  power,  the  true 
source  of  what  he  has  lost.  Before  proceeding  to  the 
opposite,  let  us  compare  with  this  common  type  the 


40  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

man  who  cotues  midway  between  the  two,  endowed, 
it  may  be,  not  exactly  with  distinguished  powers  of 
mind,  but  with  somewhat  more  than  the  ordinary 
amount  of  intellect.  He  will  take  a  dilettante  interest 
in  art,  or  devote  his  attention  to  some  branch  of 
science — botany,  for  example,  or  physics,  astronomy, 
history,  and  find  a  great  deal  of  pleasure  in  such 
studies,  and  amuse  himself  with  them  when  external 
sources  of  happiness  are  exhausted  or  fail  to  satisfy 
him  any  more.  Of  a  man  like  this  it  may  be  said  that 
his  centre  of  gravity  is  partly  in  himself.  But  a 
dilettante  interest  in  art  is  a  very  different  thing  from 
creative  activity ;  and  an  amateur  pursuit  of  science  is 
apt  to  be  superficial  and  not  to  penetrate  to  the  heart 
of  the  matter.  A  man  cannot  entirely  identify  himself 
with  such  pursuits,  or  have  his  whole  existence  so 
completely  filled  and  permeated  with  them  that  he 
loses  all  interest  in  everything  else.  It  is  only  the 
highest  intellectual  power,  what  we  call  genius,  that 
attains  to  this  degree  of  intensity,  making  all  time 
and  existence  its  theme,  and  striving  to  express  its 
peculiar  conception  of  the  world,  whether  it  contem- 
plates life  as  the  subject  of  poetry  or  of  philosophy. 
Hence,  undisturbed  occupation  with  himself,  his  own 
thoughts  and  works,  is  a  matter  of  urgent  necessity 
to  such  a  man;  solitude  is  welcome,  leisure  is  the 
highest  good,  and  everything  else  is  unnecessary,  nay, 
even  burdensome. 

This  is  the  only  type  of  man  of  whom  it  can  be 
said  that  his  centre  of  gravity  is  entirely  in  himself  ; 
which  explains  why  it  is  that  people  of  this  sort — 
and  they  are  very  rare — no  matter  how  excellent  their 


PERSONALITY,  OR  WHAT  A  MAX   IS.  41 

character  may  be,  do  not  show  that  warm  and  un- 
limited interest  in  friends,  family,  and  the  community 
in  general,  of  which  others  are  so  often  capable ;  for 
if  they  have  only  themselves  they  are  not  inconsolable 
for  the  loss  of  everything  else.  This  gives  an  isola- 
tion to  their  character,  which  is  all  the  more  effective 
since  other  people  never  really  quite  satisfy  them,  as 
being,  on  the  whole,  of  a  different  nature :  nay  more, 
since  this  difference  is  constantly  forcing  itself  upon 
their  notice,  they  get  accustomed  to  move  about 
amongst  mankind  as  alien  beings,  and  in  thinking  of 
humanity  in  general,  to  say  they  instead  of  we. 

So  the  conclusion  we  come  to  is  that  the  man 
whom  nature  has  endowed  with  intellectual  wealth  is 
the  happiest;  so  true  ib  is  that  the  subjective  concerns 
us  more  than  the  objective ;  for  whatever  the  latter 
may  be,  it  can  work  only  indirectly,  secondarily,  and 
through  the  medium  of  the  former — a  truth  finely  ex- 
pressed by  Lucian : — 

UXovros  6  tt)s  ftvxvs  kXovtos  jjlovos  IcrTiv  d\7]0rjs 
TaAAa  S'eX66  <*T7;v  TrXetova  ruv  Kreavcov1 

— the  wealth  of  the  soul  is  the  only  true  wealth,  for 
with  all  other  riches  comes  a  bane  even  greater  than 
they.  The  man  of  inner  wealth  wants  nothing  from 
outside  but  the  negative  gift  of  undisturbed  leisure, 
to  develop  and  mature  his  intellectual  faculties,  that 
is,  to  enjoy  his  wealth ;  in  short,  he  wants  permission 
to  be  himself,  his  whole  life  long,  every  day  and  every 
hour.  If  he  is  destined  to  impress  the  character  of 
his  mind  upon  a  whole  race,  he  has  only  one  measure 
1  Epigrammata,  12. 


V 


42  tHE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

of  happiness  or  unhappiness — to  succeed  or  fail  in 
perfecting  his  powers  and  completing  his  work.  AH 
else  is  of  small  consequence.  Accordingly,  the  greatest 
minds  of  all  ages  have  set  the  highest  value  upon 
undisturbed  leisure,  as  worth  exactly  as  much  as  the 
man  himself.  Happiness  appears  to  consist  in  leisure, 
says  Aristotle;1  and  Diogenes  Laertius  reports  that 
Socrates  praised  leisure  as  the  fairest  of  all  possessions. 
So,  in  the  Nichomacliean  Ethics,  Aristotle  concludes 
that  a  life  devoted  to  philosophy  is  the  happiest ;  or, 
as  he  says  in  the  Politics,2  the  free  exercise  of  any 
power,  whatever  it  may  be,  is  happiness.  This,  again, 
tallies  with  what  Goethe  says  in  Wilhelm  Meister :  The 
man  who  is  born  with  a  talent  which  he  is  meant  to 
use,  finds  his  greatest  happiness  in  using  it. 

But  to  be  in  possession  of  undisturbed  leisure  is 
far  from  being  the  common  lot;  nay,  it  is  something 
alien  to  human  nature,  for  the  ordinary  man's  destiny 
is  to  spend  life  in  procuring  what  is  necessary  for  the 
subsistence  of  himself  and  his  family ;  he  is  a  son  of 
struggle  and  need,  not  a  free  intelligence.  So  people 
as  a  rule  soon  get  tired  of  undisturbed  leisure,  and  it 
becomes  burdensome  if  there  are  no  fictitious  and 
forced  aims  to  occupy  it,  play,  pastime  and  hobbies  of 
every  kind.  For  this  very  reason  it  is  full  of  possible 
danger,  and  dijficilis  in  otio  quies  is  a  true  saying, 
— it  is  difficult  to  keep  quiet  if  you  have  nothing  to 
do.  On  the  other  hand,  a  measure  of  intellect  far 
surpassing  the  ordinary  is  as  unnatural  as  it  is 
abnormal.  But  if  it  exists,  and  the  man  endowed 
with  it  is  to  be  happy,  he  will  want  precisely  that 
1  Eth.  Nichom.  x.  7.  2  iv.  1L 


PERSONALITY,  OB  WHAT  A  MAN  IS.  43 

undisturbed  leisure  which  the  others  find  burdensome 
or  pernicious;  for  without  it  he  is  a  Pegasus  in 
harness,  and  consequently  unhappy.  If  these  two 
unnatural  circumstances,  external  and  internal,  undis- 
turbed leisure  and  great  intellect,  happen  to  coincide 
in  the  same  person,  it  is  a  great  piece  of  fortune  ;  and 
if  fate  is  so  far  favourable,  a  man  can  lead  the  higher 
life,  the  life  protected  from  the  two  opposite  sources 
of  human  suffering,  pain  and  boredom,  from  the  pain- 
ful struggle  for  existence,  and  the  incapacity  for 
enduring  leisure  (which  is  free  existence  itself) — 
evils  which  may  be  escaped  only  by  being  mutually 
neutralised. 

But  there  is  something  to  be  said  in  opposition  to 
this  view.     Great  intellectual  gifts  mean  an  activity 
pre-eminently  nervous  in  its  character,  and  consequently 
a  very  high  degree  of  susceptibility  to  pain  in  every 
form.     Further,  such  gifts  imply  an  intense  tempera- 
ment,  larger   and   more   vivid  ideas,  which,   as  the 
inseparable  accompaniment  of  great  intellectual  power, 
entail  on  its  possessor  a  corresponding  intensity  of  the 
emotions,  making  them   incomparably  more   violent 
than  those   to   which  the  ordinary  man  is   a  prey. 
Now,  there  are  more  things  in  the  world  productive 
of  pain  than  of  pleasure.     Again,  a  large  endowment 
of  intellect  tends  to  estrange  the  man  who  has  it  from 
other  people  and  their  doings ;  for  the  more  a  man 
^  has  in  himself,  the  less  he  will  be  able  to  find  in  them  ; 
and  the  hundred  things  in  which  they  take  delight, 
he  will  think  shallow  and  insipid.     Here,  then,  per- 
haps, is  another  instance  of  that  law  of  compensation 
which  makes  itself  felt  everywhere.     How  often  on© 


44  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

hears  it  said,  and  said,  too,  with  some  plausibility, 
that  the  narrow-minded  man  is  at  bottom  the 
happiest,  even  though  his  fortune  is  unenviable.  I 
shall  make  no  attempt  to  forestall  the  reader's  own 
judgment  on  this  point;  more  especially  as  Sophocles 
himself  has  given  utterance  to  two  diametrically 
opposite  opinions :  — 

IIoAAw  to  cfipovciv  evSaifiovias 
irpdrov  virapxci'.1 

he  says  in  one  place — wisdom  is  the  greatest  part  of 
happiness ;  and  again,  in  another  passage,  he  declares 
that  the  life  of  the  thoughtless  is  the  most  pleasant 
of  all— 

5Ei/  ra  <f>poveiv  yap  fxrjSlv  r/SicrTOS  J3ios.2 

The  philosophers  of  the  Old  Testament  find  them- 
selves in  a  like  contradiction. 

The  life  of  a  fool  is  worse  than  death  3 

and — 

In  much  wisdom  is  much  grief ; 

And  he  thai  increaseth  knowledge  increaseth  sorrow. 4 

I  may  remark,  however,  that  a  man  who  has  no 
mental  needs,  because  his  intellect  is  of  the  narrow 
and  normal  amount,  is,  in  the  strict  sense  of  the  word, 
what  is  called  a  philistine — an  expression  at  first 
peculiar  to  the  German  language,  a  kind  of  slang  term 
at  the  Universities,  afterwards  used,  by  analogy,  in  a 

1  Antigone,  1347-8.  8  Ecclesiasticus,  xxii.  11. 

2  Ajax,  554.  4  Ecclesiastes,  i.  18. 


PERSONALITY,   OR   WHAT  A  MAX  IS.  45 

higher  sense,  though  still  in  its  original  meaning,  as 
denoting  one  who  is  not  a  Son  of  the  Muses.  A 
philistine  is  and  remains  apovo-os  dvqp.  I  should  prefer 
to  take  a  higher  point  of  view,  and  apply  the  term 
philistine  to  people  who  are  always  seriously  occupied 

^  with  realities  which  are  no  realities ;  but  as  such  a 
definition  would  be  a  transcendental  one,  and  there- 
fore not  generally  intelligible,  it  would  hardly  be  in 
place  in  the  present  treatise,  which  aims  at  being 
popular.  The  other  definition  can  be  more  easily 
elucidated,  indicating,  as  it  does,  satisfactorily  enough, 
the  essential  nature  of  all  those  qualities  which  dis- 
tinguish   the    philistine.      He   is    defined    to   be    a 

x  man  without  mental  needs.  From  this  it  follows, 
firstly,  in  relation  to  himself  that  he  has  no  intel- 
lectual pleasures ;  for,  as  was  remarked  before,  there 
are  no  real  pleasures  without  real  needs.  The  philis- 
tine's  life  is  animated  by  no  desire  to  gain  knowledge 
and  insight  for  their  own  sake,  or  to  experience  that 
true  aesthetic  pleasure  which  is  so  nearly  akin  to  them. 
If  pleasures  of  this  kind  are  fashionable,  and  the 
philistine  finds  himself  compelled  to  pay  attention  to 
them,  he  will  force  himself  to  do  so,  but  he  will  take  as 
little  interest  in  them  as  possible.  His  only  real  pleasures 
are  of  a  sensual  kind,  and  he  thinks  that  these  indemnify 
him  for  the  loss  of  the  others.  To  him  oysters  and  cham- 
pagne are  the  height  of  existence ;  the  aim  of  his  life 
is  to  procure  what  will  contribute  to  his  bodily  welfare, 
and  he  is  indeed  in  a  happy  way  if  this  causes  him  some 
trouble,  If  the  luxuries  of  life  are  heaped  upon  him, 
he  will  inevitably  be  bored,  and  against  boredom  he 
has  a  great  many  fancied  remedies,  balls,  theatres. 


46  THE  WISDOM   OF  LIFE. 

parties,  cards,  gambling,  horses,  women,  drinking, 
travelling  and  so  on ;  all  of  which  can  not  protect  a 
man  from  being  bored,  for  where  there  are  no  intel- 
lectual needs,  no  intellectual  pleasures  are  possible. 
The  peculiar  characteristic  of  the  philistine  is  a  dull, 
dry  kind  of  gravity,  akin  to  that  of  animals.  Nothing 
really  pleases,  or  excites,  or  interests  him,  for  sensual 
pleasure  is  quickly  exhausted,  and  the  society  of 
philistines  soon  becomes  burdensome,  and  one  may 
even  get  tired  of  playing  cards.  True,  the  pleasures 
of  vanity  are  left,  pleasures  which  he  enjoys  in  his 
own  way,  either  by  feeling  himself  superior  in  point 
of  wealth,  or  rank,  or  influence  and  power  to  other 
people,  who  thereupon  pay  him  honour ;  or,  at  any 
rate,  by  going  about  with  those  who  have  a  super- 
fluity of  these  blessings,  sunning  himself  in  the 
reflection  of  their  splendour — what  the  English  call 
a  snob. 

From  the  essential  nature  of  the  philistine  it  follows, 
secondly,  in  regard  to  others,  that,  as  he  possesses  no 
intellectual,  but  only  physical  needs,  he  will  seek  the 
society  of  those  who  can  satisfy  the  latter,  but  not 
the  former.  The  last  thing  he  will  expect  from  his 
friends  is  the  possession  of  any  sort  of  intellectual 
capacity ;  nay,  if  he  chances  to  meet  with  it,  it  will 
rouse  his  antipathy  and  even  hatred  ;  simply  because 
in  addition  to  an  unpleasant  sense  of  inferiority,  he 
experiences,  in  his  heart,  a  dull  kind  of  envy,  which 
has  to  be  carefully  concealed  even  from  himself. 
Nevertheless,  it  sometimes  grows  into  a  secret  feeling 
of  rancour.  But  for  all  that,  it  wiD  never  occur  to 
him  to  make  his  own  ideas  of  worth  or  value  conform 


PERSONALITY,   OR   WHAT  A  MAN   IS.  47 

to  the  standard  of  such  qualities  ;  he  will  continue  to 
give  the  preference  to  rank  and  riches,  power  and 
influence,  which  in  his  eyes  seem  to  be  the  only 
genuine  advantages  in  the  world ;  and  his  wish  will 
be  to  excel  in  them  himself.  All  this  is  the  conse- 
quence of  his  being  a  man  without  intellectual  needs. 
The  great  affliction  of  all  philistines  is  that  they  have 
no  interest  in  ideas,  and  that,  to  escape  being  bored, 
they  are  in  constant  need  of  realities.  Now  realities 
are  either  unsatisfactory  or  dangerous ;  when  they 
lose  their  interest,  they  become  fatiguing.  But  the 
ideal  world  is  illimitable  and  calm, 

something  afar 
From  the  sphere  of  our  sorrow. 

Note. — In  these  remarks  on  the  personal  qualities 
which  go  to  make  happiness,  I  have  been  mainly  con- 
cerned with  the  physical  and  intellectual  nature  of 
man.  For  an  account  of  the  direct  and  immediate 
influence  of  morality  upon  happiness,  let  me  refer  to 
my  prize  essay  on  The  Foundation  of  Morals  (Sec 
22.) 


CHAPTER  III. 

PROPERTY,   OR  WHAT  A   MAN  HAS. 

Epicurus  divides  the  needs  of  mankind  into  three 
classes,  and  the  division  made  by  this  great  professor 
of  happiness  is  a  true  and  a  fine  one.  First  come 
natural  and  necessary  needs,  such  as,  when  not  satis- 
fied, produce  pain, — food  and  clothing,  victus  et 
amictus,  needs  which  can  easily  be  satisfied.  Secondly, 
there  are  those  needs  which,  though  natural,  are  not 
necessary,  such  as  the  gratification  of  certain  of  the 
senses.  I  may  add,  however,  that  in  the  report  given 
by  Diogenes  Laertius,  Epicurus  does  not  mention 
which  of  the  senses  he  means  ;  so  that  on  this  point 
my  account  of  his  doctrine  is  somewhat  more  definite 
and  exact  than  the  original.  These  are  needs  rather 
more  difficult  to  satisfy.  The  third  class  consists  of 
needs  which  are  neither  natural  nor  necessary,  the 
need  of  luxury  and  prodigality,  show  and  splendour, 
which  never  come  to  an  end,  and  are  very  hard  to 
satisfy.1 

It  is  difficult,  if  not  impossible,  to  define  the  limits 
which  reason  should  impose  on  the  desire  for  wealth  ; 
for  there  is  no  absolute  or  definite  amount  of  wealth 
which  will  satisfy  a  man.  The  amount  is  always 
relative,  that  is  to  say,  just  so  much  as  will  maintain 

1  Cf.  Diogenes  Laertius,  Bk.  x.,  ch.  xxvii.,  pp.  127  and  149  • 
also  Cicero  definibus,  i.,  13. 


\ 


PROPERTY,   OR  WHAT   A   MAN   HAS.  49 

the  proportion  between  what  he  wants  and  what  he 
gets;  for  to  measure  a  man's  happiness  only  by  what  he 
gets,  and  not  also  by  what  he  expects  to  get,  is  as  futile 
as  to  try  to  express  a  fraction  which  shall  have  a 
numerator  but  no  denominator.  A  man  never  feels 
the  loss  of  things  which  it  never  occurs  to  him  to  ask 
for ;  he  is  just  as  happy  without  them ;  whilst  an- 
other, who  may  have  a  hundred  times  as  much,  feels 
miserable  because  he  has  not  got  the  one  thing  which 
he  wants.  In  fact,  here  too,  every  man  has  an  horizon 
of  his  own.  and  he  will  expect  just  as  much  as  he 
thinks  it  possible  for  him  to  get.  If  an  object  within 
his  horizon  looks  as  though  he  could  confidently 
reckon  on  getting  it,  he  is  happy ;  but  if  difficulties 
come  in  the  way,  he  is  miserable.  What  lies  beyond 
his  horizon  has  no  effect  at  all  upon  him.  So  it  is 
that  the  vast  possessions  of  the  rich  do  not  agitate 
the  poor,  and  conversely,  that  a  wealthy  man  is  not 
consoled  by  all  his  wealth  for  the  failure  of  his  hopes. 
Riches,  one  may  say,  are  like  sea- water:  the  more  you 
drink,  the  thirstier  you  become  ;  and  the  same  is  true 
of  fame.  The  loss  of  wealth  and  prosperity  leaves  a 
man,  as  soon  as  the  first  pangs  of  grief  are  over,  in 
very  much  the  same  habitual  temper  as  before ;  and 
the  reason  of  this  is,  that  as  soon  as  fate  diminishes 
the  amount  of  his  possessions,  he  himself  immediately 
reduces  the  amount  of  his  claims.  But  when  misfor- 
tune comes  upon  us,  to  reduce  the  amount  of  our 
claims  is  just  what  is  most  painful;  when  once  we  have 
done  so,  the  pain  becomes  less  and  less,  and  is  felt  no 
more  ;  like  an  old  wound  which  has  healed.  Con- 
versely, when  a  piece  of  good  fortune  befalls  us,  our 


50  THE  WISDOM    OF  LIFE. 

claims  mount  higher  and  higher,  as  there  is  nothing 
to  regulate  them.  It  is  in  this  feeling  of  expansion 
that  the  delight  of  it  lies.  But  it  lasts  no  longer  than 
the  process  itself,  and  when  the  expansion  is  complete, 
the  delight  ceases:  we  have  become  accustomed  to  the 
increase  in  our  claims,  and  consequently  indifferent  to 
the  amount  of  wealth  which  satisfies  them.  There  is 
a  passage  in  the  Odyssey 1  illustrating  this  truth,  of 
which  I  may  quote  the  last  two  lines  : 

Totos  yap  voos  ecrrlv  kirL^doviinv  dv9p(o7ro)V 
Olov  J<£  fjjxap  ayet  Trarrjp  avSpwv  re  deiov  re. 

— the  thoughts  of  man  that  dwells  on  the  earth  are  as 
the  day  granted  him  by  the  father  of  gods  and  men. 
Discontent  springs  from  a  constant  endeavour  to  in- 
crease the  amount  of  our  claims,  when  we  are  power- 
less to  increase  the  amount  which  will  satisfy  them. 

When  we  consider  how  full  of  needs  the  human 
race  is,  how  its  whole  existence  is  based  upon  them,  it 
is  not  a  matter  for  surprise  that  wealth  is  held  in 
more  sincere  esteem,  nay,  in  greater  honour,  than 
anything  else  in  the  world  ;  nor  ought  we  to  wonder 
that  gain  is  made  the  only  goal  of  life,  and  everything 
that  does  not  lead  to  it  pushed  aside  or  thrown  over- 
board— philosophy,  for  instance,  by  those  who  profess 
it.  People  are  often  reproached  for  wishing  for  money 
above  all  things,  and  for  loving  it  more  than  anything 
else  ;  but  it  is  natural  and  even  inevitable  for  people 
to  love  that  which,  like  an  unwearied  Proteus,  is 
always  ready  to  turn  itself  into  whatever  object  their 
wandering  wishes  or  manifold  desires  may  for  the 
i  xviii.,  130-7. 


r 

PROPERTY,  OR  WHAT  A  MAN  HAS.  51      ' 

moment  fix  upon  Everything  else  can  satisfy  only 
one  wish,  one  need  :  food  is  good  only  if  you  are 
hungry ;  wine,  if  you  are  able  to  enjoy  it ;  drugs,  if 
you  are  sick  ;  fur  for  the  winter  ;  love  for  youth,  and 
so  on.  These  are  all  only  relatively  good,  ayaOa  tt/jos  t«. 
Money  alone  is  absolutely  good,  because  it  is  not  only 
a  concrete  satisfaction  of  one  need  in  particular ;  it  is 
an  abstract  satisfaction  of  all. 

If  a  man  has  an  independent  fortune,  he  should 
regard  it  as  a  bulwark  against  the  many  evils  and 
misfortunes  which  lie  may  encounter;  he  should  not'  '  <\<<^-** 
look  upon  it  as  giving  him  leave  to  get  what  plea- 
sure he  can  out  of  the  world,  or  as  rendering  it 
incumbent  upon  him  to  spend  it  in  this  way.  /People 
who  are  not  born  with  a  fortune,  but  end  by  making 
a  large  one  through  the  exercise  of  whatever  talents 
they  possess,  almost  always  come  to  think  that  their 
talents  are  their  capital,  and  that  the  money  they 
have  gained  is  merely  the  interest  upon  it ;  they  do 
not  lay  by  a  part  of  their  earnings  to  form  permanent 
capital,  but  spend  their  money  much  as  they  have 
earned  it.  Accordingly,  they  often  fall  into  poverty  : 
their  earmngs  decrease,  or  come  to  an  end  altogether, 
either  because  their  talent  is  exhausted  by  becoming 
antiquated, — as,  for  instance,  very  often  happens  in 
the  case  of  fine  art — or  else  it  was  valid  only  under  a 
special  conjunction  of  circumstances  which  has  now 
passed  away.  There  is  nothing  to  prevent  those  who 
live  on  the  common  labour  of  their  hands  from  treat- 
ing their  earnings  in  that  way  if  they  like  ;  because 
their  kind  of  skill  is  not  likely  to  disappear,  or,  if  it 
does,  it  can  be  replaced  by  that  of  their  fellow- work- 


52  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

men ;  moreover,  the  kind  of  work  they  do  is  always 
in  demand  ;  so  that  what  the  proverb  says  is  quite 
true,  a  useful  trade  is  a  mine  of  gold.  But  with 
artists  and  professionals  of  every  kind  the  case  is 
quite  different,  and  that  is  the  reason  why  they  are 
well  paid.  They  ought  to  build  up  a  capital  out  of 
their  earnings;  but  they  recklessly  look  upon  them 
as  merely  interest,  and  end  in  ruin.  On  the  other 
hand,  people  who  inherit  money  know,  at  least,  how 
to  distinguish  between  capital  and  interest,  and  most 
of  them  try  to  make  their  capital  secure  and  not 
encroach  upon  it ;  nay,  if  they  can,  they  put  by  at 
least  an  eighth  of  their  interest  in  order  to  meet 
future  contingencies.  So  most  of  them  maintain 
their  position.  These  few  remarks  about  capital  and 
interest  are  not  applicable  to  commercial  life,  for 
merchants  look  upon  money  only  as  a  means  of 
further  gain,  just  as  a  workman  regards  his  tools  ;  so 
even  if  their  capital  has  been  entirely  the  result  of 
their  own  efforts,  they  try  to  preserve  and  increase  it 
by  using  it.  Accordingly,  wealth  is  nowhere  so  much 
at  home  as  in  the  merchant  class. 

It  will  generally  be  found  that  those  who  know 
what  it  is  to  have  been  in  need  and  destitution  are 
very  much  less  afraid  of  it,  and  consequently  more 
inclined  to  extravagance,  than  those  who  know  poverty 
only  by  hearsay.  People  who  have  been  born  and 
bred  in  good  circumstances  are  as  a  rule  much  more 
careful  about  the  future,  more  economical,  in  fact, 
than  those  who  by  a  piece  of  good  luck,  have  sud- 
denly passed  from  poverty  to  wealth.  This  looks  as 
if  poverty  were  not  really  such  a  very  wretched  thing 


PROPERTY,  OR  WHAT  A  MAN   HAS.  53 

as  it  appears  from  a  distance.  The  true  reason, 
however,  is  rather  the  fact  that  the  man  who  has 
been  born  into  a  position  of  wealth  comes  to  look 
upon  it  as  something  without  which  he  could  no  more 
live  than  he  could  live  without  air ;  he  guards  it  as 
he  does  his  very  life  ;  and  so  he  is  generally  a  lover 
of  order,  prudent  and  economical.  But  the  man  who 
has  been  born  into  a  poor  position  looks  upon  it  as 
the  natural  one,  and  if  by  any  chance  he  comes  in  for 
a  fortune,  he  regards  it  as  a  superfluity,  something  to 
be  enjoyed  or  wasted,  because,  if  it  comes  to  an  end, 
he  can  get  on  just  as  well  as  before,  with  one  anxiety 
the  less ;  or,  as  Shakespeare  says  in  Henry  VI.,1 

....  the  adage  must  be  verified 
That  beggars  mounted  run  their  horse  to  death. 

But  it  should  be  said  that  people  of  this  kind  have  a 
firm  and  excessive  trust,  partly  in  fate,  partly  in  the 
peculiar  means  which  have  already  raised  them  out 
of  need  and  poverty, — a  trust  not  only  of  the  head,  but 
of  the  heart  also ;  and  so  they  do  not,  like  the  man 
born  rich,  look  upon  the  shallows  of  poverty  as 
bottomless,  but  console  themselves  with  the  thought 
that  when  they  have  touched  ground  again,  they  can 
take  another  upward  flight.  It  is  this  trait  in  human 
character  which  explains  the  fact  that  women  who 
were  poor  before  their  marriage  often  make  greater 
claims,  and  are  more  extravagant,  than  those  who 
have  brought  their  husbands  a  rich  dowry ;  because 
as  a  rule,  rich  girls  bring  with  them,  not  only  a 
fortune,  but  also  more  eagerness,  nay,  more  of  the 
1  Part  III.,  Act  1,  Sc.  4. 


54  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

inherited  instinct,  to  preserve  it,  than  poor  girls  do. 
If  anyone  doubts  the  truth  of  this,  and  thinks  that  it 
is  just  the  opposite,  he  will  find  authority  for  his 
view  in  Ariosto's  first  Satire ;  but,  on  the  other  hand, 
Dr.  Johnson  agrees  with  my  opinion.  A  woman  of 
fortune,  he  says,  being  used  to  the  handling  of  money, 
spends  it  judiciously ;  but  a  woman  who  gets  the 
command  of  money  for  the  first  time  upon  her  mar- 
riage, has  such  a  gusto  in  spending  it,  that  she  throws 
it  away  with  great  profusion}  And  in  any  case  let 
me  advise  anyone  who  marries  a  poor  girl  not  to 
leave  her  the  capital  but  only  the  interest,  and  to 
take  especial  care  that  she  has  not  the  management 
of  the  children's  fortune. 

I  do  not  by  any  means  think  that  I  am  touching 
upon  a  subject  which  is  not  worth  my  while  to 
mention  when  I  recommend  people  to  be  careful  to 
preserve  what  they  have  earned  or  inherited.  For  to 
start  life  with  just  as  much  as  will  make  one  inde- 
pendent, that  is,  allow  one  to  live  comfortably  with- 
out having  to  work — even  if  one  has  only  just  enough 
for  oneself,  not  to  speak  of  a  family — is  an  advantage 
which  cannot  be  over-estimated ;  for  it  means  exemp- 
tion and  immunity  from  that  chronic  disease  of 
penury,  which  fastens  on  the  life  of  man  like  a 
plague ;  it  is  emancipation  from  that  forced  labour 
which  is  the  natural  lot  of  every  mortal.  Only  under 
a  favourable  fate  like  this  can  a  man  be  said  to  be 
born  free,  to  be,  in  the  proper  sense  of  the  word,  sui 
juris,  master  of  his  own  time  and  powers,  and  able  to 
say  every  morning,  This  day  is  my  own.  And  just 
1  Boswell's  Life  of  Johnson  :  ann  :  1776,  setat :  67. 


PROPERTY,  OR  WHAT  A  MAX  HAS.  55 

for  the  same  reason  the  difference  between  the  man 
who  has  a  hundred  a  year  and  the  man  who  has  a 
thousand,  is  infinitely  smaller  than  the  difference  be- 
tween the  former  and  a  man  who  has  nothing  at  all. 
But  inherited  wealth  reaches  its  utmost  value  when  it 
falls  to  the  individual  endowed  with  mental  powers 
of  a  high  order,  who  is  resolved  to  pursue  a  line  of 
life  not  compatible  with  the  making  of  money  j  for 
he  is  then  doubly  endowed  by  fate  and  can  live  for 
his  genius  ;  and  he  will  pay  his  debt  to  mankind  a 
hundred  times,  by  achieving  what  no  other  could 
achieve,  by  producing  some  work  which  contributes 
to  the  general  good,  and  redounds  to  the  honour  of 
humanity  at  large.  Another,  again,  may  use  his 
wealth  to  further  philanthropic  schemes,  and  make 
himself  well-deserving  of  his  fellow-men.  But  a  man 
who  does  none  of  these  things,  who  does  not  even  try 
to  do  them,  who  never  attempts  to  study  thoroughly 
some  one  branch  of  knowledge  so  that  he  may  at 
least  do  what  he  can  towards  promoting  it — such  a 
one,  born  as  he  is  into  riches,  is  a  mere  idler  and 
thief  of  time,  a  contemptible  fellow.  He  will  not 
even  be  happy,  because,  in  his  ease,  exemption  from 
need  delivers  him  up  to  the  other  extreme  of  human 
suffering,  boredom,  which  is  such  martyrdom  to  him, 
that  he  would  have  been  better  off  if  poverty  had 
given  him  something  to  do.  And  as  he  is  bored  he  is 
apt  to  be  extravagant,  and  so  lose  the  advantage  of 
which  he  showed  himself  unworthy.  Countless  numbers 
of  people  find  themselves  in  want,  simply  because,  when 
they  had  money,  they  spent  it  only  to  get  momentary 
relief  from  the  feeling  of  boredom  which  oppressed  them. 


56  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

It  is  quite  another  matter  if  one's  object  is  success  m 
political  life,  where  favour,  friends  and  connections 
are  all- important,  in  order  to  mount  by  their  aid  step 
by  step  on  the  ladder  of  promotion,  and  perhaps  gain 
the  topmost  rung.  In  this  kind  of  life,  it  is  much 
better  to  be  cast  on  the  world  without  a  penny  ;  and 
if  the  aspirant  is  not  of  noble  family,  but  is  a  man  of 
some  talent,  it  will  redound  to  his  advantage  to  be  an 
absolute  pauper.  For  what  every  one  most  aims  at 
in  ordinary  contact  with  his  fellows  is  to  prove  them 
inferior  to  himself ;  and  how  much  more  is  this  the 
case  in  politics.  Now,  it  is  only  an  absolute 
pauper  who  has  such  a  thorough  conviction  of  his 
own  complete,  profound  and  positive  inferiority  from 
every  point  of  view,  of  his  own  utter  insignificance 
and  worthlessness,  that  he  can  take  his  place  quietly 
in  the  political  machine.1  He  is  the  only  one  who 
can  keep  on  bowing  low  enough,  and  even  go  right 
down  upon  his  face  if  necessary ;  he  alone  can  sub- 
mit to  everything  and  laugh  at  it ;  he  alone  knows  the 
entire  worthlessness  of  merit;  he  alone  uses  his 
loudest  voice  and  his  boldest  type  whenever  he  has  to 
speak  or  write  of  those  who  are  placed  over  his  head, 
or  occupy  any  position  of  influence  ;  and  if  they  do  a 
little  scribbling,  he  is  ready  to  applaud  it  as  a  master- 
work.      He  alone  understands  how   to   beg,   and   so 

1  Translator's  Note. — Schopenhauer  is  probably  here  making 
one  of  his  many  virulent  attacks  upon  Hegel ;  in  this  case  on 
account  of  what  he  thought  to  be  the  philosopher's  abject 
servility  to  the  government  of  his  day.  Though  the  Hegelian 
system  has  been  the  fruitful  mother  of  many  liberal  ideas,  there 
can  be  no  doubt  that  Hegel's  influence,  in  his  own  life-time,  was 
an  effective  support  of  Prussian  bureaucracy. 


PROPERTY,   OR  WHAT  A  MAN   HAS.  57 

betimes,  when  he  is  hardly  out  of  his  boyhood,  he 
becomes  a  high  priest  of  that  hidden  mystery  which 
Goethe  brings  to  light ; — 

Utber's  Niedertraehtige 
Niemand  sich  beklage : 
JDenn  es  ist  das  Machtige 
Was  man  dir  auch  sage  : 

— it  is  no  use  to  complain  of  low  aims ;  for,  whatever 
people  may  say,  they  rule  the  world. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  man  who  is  born  with 
enough  to  live  upon  is  generally  of  a  somewhat  inde- 
pendent turn  of  mind  ;  he  is  accustomed  to  keep  his 
head  up ;  he  has  not  learned  all  the  arts  of  the 
beggar ;  perhaps  he  even  presumes  a  little  upon  the 
possession  of  talents  which,  as  he  ought  to  know,  can 
never  compete  with  cringing  mediocrity ;  in  the  long 
run  he  comes  to  recognise  the  inferiority  of  those  who 
are  placed  over  his  head,  and  when  they  try  to  put 
insults  upon  him,  he  becomes  refractory  and  shy. 
This  is  not  the  way  to  get  on  in  the  world.  Nay, 
such  a  man  may  at  last  incline  to  the  opinion  freely 
expressed  by  Voltaire:  We  have  only  two  days  to  live  ; 
it  is  not  worth  our  while  to  spend  them  in  cringing  to 
contemptible  rascals.  But  alas  !  let  me  observe  by  the 
way,  that  contemptible  rascal  is  an  attribute  which 
may  be  predicated  of  an  abominable  number  of  people. 
What  Juvenal  says — it  is  difficult  to  rise  if  your 
poverty  is  greater  than  your  talent — 

Hand  facile  emergunt  qiwrum  virtutibus  obstat 
Res  angusta  domi — 

is  more  applicable  to  a  eareer  of  art  and  literature 
than  to  political  and  social  ambition. 


58  THE  WISDOM   OF  LIFE. 

Wife  and  children  I  have  not  reckoned  amongst  a 
man's  possessions :  he  is  rather  in  their  possession.  It 
would  be  easier  to  include  friends  under  that  head ; 
but  a  man's  friends  belong  to  him  not  a  whit  more 
than  he  belongs  to  them. 


CHAPTER  IV. 


POSITION,  OR  A  MAN  S  PLACE  IN  THE  ESTIMATION  OF 
OTHERS. 

Section  1. — Reputation. 

By  a  peculiar  weakness  of  human  nature,  people  gene- 
rally think  too  much  about  the  opinion  which  others 
form  of  them;  although  the  slightest  reflection  will  show 
that  this  opinion,  whatever  it  may  be,  is  not  in  itself 
essential  to  happiness.  Therefore  it  is  hard  to  under- 
stand why  everybody  feels  so  very  pleased  when  he 
sees  that  other  people  have  a  good  opinion  of  him,  or 
say  anything  flattering  to  his  vanity.  If  you  stroke 
a  cat,  it  will  purr ;  and,  as  inevitably,  if  you  praise  a 
man,  a  sweet  expression  of  delight  will  appear  on  his 
face  ;  and  even  though  the  praise  is  a  palpable  lie,  it 
will  be  welcome,  if  the  matter  is  one  on  which  he 
prides  himself.  If  only  other  people  will  applaud 
him,  a  man  may  console  himself  for  downright  mis- 
fortune, or  for  the  pittance  he  gets  from  the  two 
sources  of  human  happiness  already  discussed ;  and 
conversely,  it  is  astonishing  how  infallibly  a  man  will 
be  annoyed,  and  in  some  cases  deeply  pained,  by  any 
wrong  done  to  his  feeling  of  self-importance,  whatever 
be  the  nature,  degree,  or  circumstances  of  the  injury, 
or  by  any  depreciation,  slight,  or  disregard. 


60  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

If  the  feeling  of  honour  rests  upon  this  peculiarity 
of  human  nature,  it  may  have  a  very  salutary  effect 
upon  the  welfare  of  a  great  many  people,  as  a  substi- 
tute for  morality;  but  upon  their  happiness,  more 
especially  upon  that  peace  of  mind  and  independence 
which  are  so  essential  to  happiness,  its  effect  will  be 
disturbing  and  prejudicial  rather  than  salutary, 
Therefore  it  is  advisable,  from  our  point  of  view, 
to  set  limits  to  this  weakness,  and  duly  to  con- 
sider and  rightly  to  estimate  the  relative  value  of  ad- 
vantages, and  thus  temper,  as  far  as  possible,  this  great 
susceptibility  to  other  people's  opinion,  whether  the 
opinion  be  one  flattering  to  our  vanity,  or  whether  it 
causes  us  pain ;  for  in  either  case  it  is  the  same  feel- 
ing which  is  touched.  Otherwise,  a  man  is  the  slave  of 
what  other  people  are  pleased  to  think, — and  how 
little  it  requires  to  disconcert  or  soothe  the  mind  that 
is  greedy  of  praise  :— 

Sic  leve,  sic  parvum  est,  animum  quod  laudis  avarum 
Subruit  ac  reficit.1 

Therefore  it  will  very  much  conduce  to  our  happi- 
ness if  we  duly  compare  the  value  of  what  a  man  is 
in  and  for  himself  with  what  he  is  in  the  eyes  of 
others.  Under  the  former  comes  everything  that  fills 
up  the  span  of  our  existence  and  makes  it  what  it  is, 
in  short,  all  the  advantages  already  considered  and 
summed  up  under  the  heads  of  personality  and  pro- 
perty ;  and  the  sphere  in  which  all  this  takes  place  is 
the  man's  own  consciousness.     On  the  other  hand,  the 

1  Horace,  Epist :  II,  1,  180. 


REPUTATION.  61 

sphere  of  what  we  are  for  other  people  is  their  con- 
sciousness, not  ours  ;  it  is  the  kind  of  figure  we  make 
in  their  eyes,  together  with  the  thoughts  which  this 
arouses.1  But  this  is  something  which  has  no  direct 
and  immediate  existence  for  us,  but  can  affect  us  only 
mediately  and  indirectly,  so  far,  that  is,  as  other 
people's  behaviour  towards  us  is  directed  by  it ;  and 
even  then  it  ought  to  affect  us  only  in  so  far  as  it  can 
move  us  to  modify  what  we  are  in  and  for  ourselves. 
Apart  from  this,  what  goes  on  in  other  people's  con- 
sciousness is,  as  such,  a  matter  of  indifference  to  us : 
and  in  time  we  get  really  indifferent  to  it,  when  we 
come  to  see  how  superficial  and  futile  are  most  people's 
thoughts,  how  narrow  their  ideas,  how  mean  their 
sentiments,  how  perverse  their  opinions,  and  how 
much  of  error  there  is  in  most  of  them ;  when  we 
learn  by  experience  with  what  depreciation  a  man 
will  speak  of  his  fellow,  when  he  is  not  obliged  to  fear 
him,  or  thinks  that  what  he  says  will  not  come  to  his 
ears.  And  if  ever  we  have  had  an  opportunity  of 
seeing  how  the  greatest  of  men  will  meet  with  nothing 
but  slight  from  half-a-dozen  blockheads,  we  shall 
understand  that  to  lay  great  value  upon  what  other 
people  say  is  to  pay  them  too  much  honour. 

At  all  events,  a  man  is  in  a  very  bad  way,  who  finds 
no  source  of  happiness  in  the  first  two  classes  of  bless- 
ings already  treated  of,  but  has  to  seek  it  in  the  third, 
in  other  words,  not  in  what  he  is  in  himself,  but  in 

1  Let  me  remark  that  people  in  the  highest  positions  in  life, 
with  all  their  brilliance,  pomp,  display,  magnificence  and  general 
show,  may  well  say  : — Our  happiness  lies  entirely  outside  us,  for 
\  it  exists  only  in  the  heads  of  others. 


62  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

what  he  is  in  the  opinion  of  others.  For,  after  all, 
the  foundation  of  our  whole  nature,  and,  therefore,  of 
our  happiness,  is  our  physique,  and  the  most  essential 
factor  in  happiness  is  health,  and,  next  in  importance 
after  health,  the  ability  to  maintain  ourselves  in  inde- 
pendence and  freedom  from  caref)  There  can  be  no 
competition  or  compensation  between  these  essential 
factors  on  the  one  side,  and  honour,  pomp,  rank  and 
reputation  on  the  other,  however  much  value  we  may 
set  upon  the  latter.  No  one  would  hesitate  to  sacri- 
fice the  latter  for  the  former,  if  it  were  necessary. 
We  should  add  very  much  to  our  happiness  by  a 
timely  recognition  of  the  simple  truth  that  every 
man's  chief  and  real  existence  is  in  his  own  skin,  and 
not  in  other  people's  opinions;  and,  consequently,  that 
the  actual  conditions  of  our  personal  life, — health, 
temperament,  capacity,  income,  wife,  children,  friends, 
home,  are  a  hundred  times  more  important  for  our 
happiness  than  what  other  people  are  pleased  to  think 
of  us;  otherwise  we  shall  be  miserable.  And  if  people 
insist  that  honour  is  dearer  than  life" itself,  what  they 
really  mean  is  that  existence  and  well-being  are  as 
nothing  compared  with  other  people's  opinions.  Of 
course,  this  may  be  only  an  exaggerated  way  of  stat- 
ing the  prosaic  truth  that  reputation,  that  is,  the 
opinion  others  have  of  us,  is  indispensable  if  we  are 
to  make  any  progress  in  the  world  ;  but  I  shall  come 
back  to  that  presently.  When  we  see  that  almost 
everything  men  devote  their  lives  to  attain,  sparing 
no  effort  and  encountering  a  thousand  toils  and  dangers 
in  the  process,  has,  in  the  end,  no  further  object  than 
to  raise  themselves  in  the  estimation  of  others ;  whep 


DEPUTATION.  63 


we  see  that  not  only  offices,  titles,  decorations,  but  also 
wealth,  nay,  even  knowledge x  and  art,  are  striven  f 01 
only  to  obtain,  as  the  ultimate  goal  of  all  effort, 
greater  respect  from  one's  fellow-men, — is  not  this  a 
lamentable  proof  of  the  extent  to  which  human  folly 
can  go  ?  To  set  much  too  high  a  value  on  other 
people's  opinion  is  a  common  error  everywhere ;  an 
error,  it  may  be,  rooted  in  human  nature  itself,  or  the 
result  of  civilisation  and  social  arrangements  gener- 
ally ;  but,  whatever  its  source,  it  exercises  a  very 
immoderate  influence  on  all  we  do,  and  is  very  preju- 
dicial to  our  happiness.  We  can  trace  it  from  a.  /sr7fUj\ 
timorous  and  slavish  regard  for  what  other  people 
will  say,  up  to  the  feeling  which  made  Virginius, 
plunge  the  dagger  into  his  daughter's  heart,  or  induces  f/ 
many  a  man  to  sacrifice  quiet,  riches,  health  and  even 
life  itself,  for  posthumous  glory.  )  Undoubtedly  this 
feeling  is  a  very  convenient  instrument  in  the  hands 
of  those  who  have  the  control  or  direction  of  their 
fellow-men;  and  accordingly  we  find  that  in  every 
scheme  for  training  up  humanity  in  the  way  it  should 
go,  the  maintenance  and  strengthening  of  the  feeling 
of  honour  occupies  an  important  place.  But  it  is 
quite  a  different  matter  in  its  effect  on  human  happiness, 
of  which  it  is  here  our  object  to  treat;  and  we  should 
rather  be  careful  to  dissuade  people  from  setting  too 
much  store  by  what  others  think  of  them.  Daily  ex- 
perience shows  us,  however,  that  this  is  just  the  mis- 
take people  persist  in  making;  most  men  set  the 
utmost  value  precisely  on  what  other  people  think, 

1  Scire  tuum  nihil  est  nisi  te  scire  hoc  sciat  alter,  (Persius  i.  27) 
*— knowledge  is  no  use  unless  others  know  that  you  have  it. 


64  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

and  are  more  concerned  about  it  than  about  what  goes 
on  in  their  own  consciousness,  which  is  the  thing  most 
immediately  and  directly  present  to  them.  They 
reverse  the  natural  order, — regarding  the  opinions  o£ 
others  as  real  existence  and  their  own  consciousness 
as  something  shadowy;  making  the  derivative  and 
secondary  into  the  principal,  and  considering  the 
picture  they  present  to  the  world  of  more  importance 
than  their  own  selves.  By  thus  trying  to  get  a  direct 
and  immediate  result  out  of  what  has  no  really  direct 
or  immediate  existence,  they  fall  into  the  kind  of  folly 
which  is  called  vanity — the  appropriate  term  for  that 
which  has  no  solid  or  intrinsic  value.  Like  a  miser, 
such  people  forget  the  end  in  their  eagerness  to  obtain 
the  means. 

The  truth  is  that  the  value  we  set  upon  the  opinion 
of  others,  and  our  constant  endeavour  in  respect  of  it, 
are  each  quite  out  of  proportion  to  any  result  we  may 
reasonably  hope  to  attain ;  so  that  this  attention  to 
other  people's  attitude  may  be  regarded  as  a  kind  of 
universal  mania  which  everyone  inherits.  In  all  we 
do,  almost  the  first  thing  we  think  about  is  :  What  will 
people  say ;  and  nearly  half  the  troubles  and  bothers 
of  life  may  be  traced  to  our  anxiety  on  this  score  ;  it 
is  the  anxiety  which  is  at  the  bottom  of  all  that 
feeling  of  self-importance,  which  is  so  often  mortified 
because  it  is  so  very  morbidly  sensitive.  It  is  solici- 
tude about  what  others  will  say  that  underlies  all  our 
vanity  and  pretension,  yes,  and  all  our  show  and 
swagger  too.  Without  it,  there  would  not  be  a  tenth 
part  of  the  luxury  which  exists.  Pride  in  every  form, 
"point  d'honneur  and  punctilio,  however  varied  their 


rvEPUTATIOX.  G5 

kind  or  sphere,  are  at  bottom  nothing  but  this — 
anxiety  about  what  others  will  say — and  what  sacri- 
fices it  often  costs  !  One  can  see  it  even  in  a  child  ; 
and  though  it  exists  at  every  period  of  life,  it  is 
strongest  in  age;  because,  when  the  capacity  for 
sensual  pleasure  fails,  vanity  and  pride  have  only 
avarice  to  share  their  dominion.  Frenchmen,  perhaps, 
afford  the  best  example  of  this  feeling,  and  amongst 
them  it  is  a  regular  epidemic,  appearing  sometimes  in 
the  most  absurd  ambition,  or  in  a  ridiculous  kind  of 
national  vanity  and  the  most  shameless  boasting. 
However,  they  frustrate  their  own  aims,  for  other 
people  make  fun  of  them  and  call  them  la  grande 
nation. 

By  way  of  specially  illustrating  this  perverse  and 
exuberant  respect  for  other  people's  opinion,  let  me 
take  a  passage  from  the  Times  of  March  31st,  1846, 
giving  a  detailed  account  of  the  execution  of  one 
Thomas  Wix,  an  apprentice  who,  from  motives  of 
vengeance,  had  murdered  his  master.  Here  we  have 
very  unusual  circumstances  and  an  extraordinary 
character,  though  one  very  suitable  for  our  purpose  ; 
and  these  combine  to  give  a  striking  picture  of  this 
folly,  which  is  so  deeply  rooted  in  human  nature,  and 
allow  us  to  form  an  accurate  notion  of  the  extent  to 
which  it  will  go.  On  the  morning  of  the  execution, 
jays  the  report,  the  rev.  ordinary  was  early  in 
attendance  upon  him,  but  Wix,  beyond  a  quiet 
demeanour,  betrayed  no  interest  in  his  ministrations, 
appearing  to  feel  anxious  only  to  acquit  himself 
"  bravely  "  before  the  spectators  of  his  ignominious 
end In  the  procession  Wix  fell  into  his 

E 


GO  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE 

proper  place  with  alacrity,  and,  as  he  entered  the 
Chapel-yard,  remarked,  sufficiently  loud  to  be  heard 
by  several  persons  near  him,  "Now,  then,  as  Dr.  J) odd 
said,  I  shall  soon  know  the  grand  secret"  On  reach- 
ing the  scaffold,  the  miserable  wretch  mounted  the 
drop  without  the  slightest  assistance,  and  when  he 
got  to  the  centre,  he  bowed  to  the  spectators  twice,  a 
proceeding  which  called  forth  a  tremendous  cheer 
from  the  degraded  crowd  beneath. 

This  is  an  admirable  example  of  the  way  in  which  a 
man,  with  death  in  the  most  dreadful  form  before  his 
very  eyes,  and  eternity  beyond  it,  will  care  for 
nothing  but  the  impression  he  makes  upon  a  crowd  of 
gapers,  and  the  opinion  he  leaves  behind  him  in  their 
heads.  There  was  much  the  same  kind  of  thing  in 
the  case  of  Lecomte,  wTho  was  executed  at  Frankfurt, 
also  in  1846,  for  an  attempt  on  the  king's  life.  At  the 
trial  he  was  verjT  much  annoyed  that  he  was  not 
allowed  to  appear,  in  decent  attire,  before  the  Upper 
House ;  and  on  the  day  of  the  execution  it  was  a 
special  grief  to  him  that  he  was  not  permitted  to 
shave.  It  is  not  only  in  recent  times  that  this  kind 
of  thing  has  been  known  to  happen.  Mateo  Aleman 
tells  us,  in  the  Introduction  to  his  celebrated  romance, 
Guzman  de  Alfarache,  that  many  infatuated  criminals, 
instead  of  devoting  their  last  hours  to  the  welfare  of 
their  souls,  as  they  ought  to  have  done,  neglect  this 
duty  for  the  purpose  of  preparing  and  committing  to 
memory  a  speech  to  be  made  from  the  scaffold. 

I  take  these  extreme  cases  as  being  the  best  illus- 
trations of  what  I  mean  ;  for  they  give  us  a  magnified 
reflection  of  our  own  nature.     The  anxieties  of  all  of 


REPUTATION.  6-7 

us,  our  worries,  vexations,  bothers,  troubles,  uneasy 
apprehensions  and  strenuous  efforts  are  due,  in  perhaps 
the  large  majority  of  instances,  to  what  other  people 
will  say;  and  we  are  just  as  foolish  in  this  respect  as 
those  miserable  criminals.  Envy  and  hatred  are  very 
often  traceable  to  a  similar  source. 

Now,  it  is  obvious  that  happiness,  which  consists 
for  the  most  part  in  peace  of  mind  and  contentment, 
would  be  served  by  nothing  so  much  as  by  reducing 
this  impulse  of  human  nature  within  reasonable  limits, 
— which  would  perhaps  make  it  one  fiftieth  part  of 
what  it  is  now.  By  doing  so,  we  should  get  rid  of  a 
thorn  in  the  flesh  which  is  always  causing  us  pain. 
But  it  is  a  very  difficult  task,  because  the  impulse  in 
question  is  a  natural  and  innate  perversity  of  human 
nature.  Tacitus  says,  The  lust  of  fame  is  the  last  that 
a  wise  man  shakes  off.1  The  only  way  of  putting  an 
end  to  this  universal  folly  is  to  see  clearly  that  it  is  a 
folly ;  and  this  may  be  done  by  recognising  the  fact 
that  most  of  the  opinions  in  men's  heads  are  apt  to  be 
false,  perverse,  erroneous  and  absurd,  and  so  in  them- 
selves unworthy  of  any  attention  ;  further,  that  other 
people's  opinions  can  have  very  little  real  and  positive 
influence  upon  us  in  most  of  the  circumstances  and 
affairs  of  life.  Again,  this  opinion  is  generally  of  such 
an  unfavourable  character  that  it  would  worry  a  man 
to  death  to  hear  everything  that  was  said  of  him,  or 
the  tone  in  which  he  was  spoken  of.  And  finally, 
among  other  things,  we  should  be  clear  about  the  fact 
that  honour  itself  has  no  really  direct,  but  only  an 
indirect,  value.  If  people  were  generally  converted 
1  Hist.,  iv.,  6. 


s 


68  THE  WISDOM   OF  LIFE. 

from  this  universal  folly,  the  result  would  be  such  an 
addition  to  our  peace  of  mind  and  cheerfulness  as  at 
present  seems  inconceivable ;  people  would  present  a 
firmer  and  more  confident  front  to  the  world,  and 
generally  behave  with  less  embarrassment  and  re- 
straint. It  is  observable  that  a  retired  mode  of  life 
has  an  exceedingly  beneficial  influence  on  our  peace  of 
mind,  and  this  is  mainly  because  we  thus  escape 
having  to  live  constantly  in  the  sight  of  others,  and 
pay  everlasting  regard  to  their  casual  opinions  ;  in  a 
word,  we  are  able  to  return  upon  ourselves.  At  the 
same  time  a  good  deal  of  positive  misfortune  might  be 
avoided,  which  we  are  now  drawn  into  by  striving 
after  shadows,  or,  to  speak  more  correctly,  by  indulg- 
ing a  mischievous  piece  of  folly ;  and  we  should  con- 
sequently have  more  attention  to  give  to  solid  realities 
and  enjoy  them  with  less  interruption  than  at  present. 
But  xa^e7I«  T<*  KaAa — what  is  worth  doing  is  hard  to  do. 

Section  2. — Pride. 

The  folly  of  our  nature  which  we  are  discussing 
puts  forth  three  shoots,  ambition,  vanity  and  pride. 
The  difference  between  the  last  two  is  this :  pride  is 
an  established  conviction  of  one's  own  paramount 
worth  in  some  particular  respect ;  while  vanity  is  the 
desire  of  rousing  such  a  conviction  in  others,  and  it  is 
generally  accompanied  by  the  secret  hope  of  ulti- 
mately coming  to  the  same  conviction  oneself.  Pride 
works  from  within ;  it  is  the  direct  appreciation  of 
oneself.  Vanity  is  the  desire  to  arrive  at  this  appre- 
ciation indirectly,  from  without.     So  we  find  that  vain 


PRIDE.  69 

people  are  talkative,  and  proud,  taciturn.  But  the 
vain  person  ought  to  be  aware  that  the  good  opinion 
of  others,  which  he  strives  for,  may  be  obtained  much 
more  easily  and  certainly  by  persistent  silence  than  by 
speech,  even  though  he  has  very  good  things  to  say. 
Anyone  who  wishes  to  affect  pride  is  not  therefore  a 
proud  man ;  but  he  will  soon  have  to  drop  this,  as 
every  other,  assumed  character. 

It  is  only  a  firm,  unshakeable  conviction  of  pre- 
eminent worth  and  special  value  which  makes  a  man 
proud  in  the  true  sense  of  the  word, — a  conviction 
which  may,  no  doubt,  be  a  mistaken  one  or  rest  on 
advantages  which  are  of  an  adventitious  and  conven- 
tional character :  still  pride  is  not  the  less  pride  for 
all  that,  so  long  as  it  be  present  in  real  earnest.  And 
since  pride  is  thus  rooted  in  conviction,  it  resembles 
every  other  form  of  knowledge  in  not  being  within 
our  own  arbitrament.  Pride's  worst  foe, — I  mean  its 
greatest  obstacle, — is  vanity,  which  courts  the  ap- 
plause of  the  world  in  order  to  gain  the  necessary 
foundation  for  a  high  opinion  of  one's  own  worth, 
whilst  pride  is  based  upon  a  pre-existing  conviction 
of  it. 

It  is  quite  true  that  pride  is  something  which  is 
generally  found  fault  with,  and  cried  down ;  but 
usually,  I  imagine,  by  those  who  have  nothing  upon 
which  they  can  pride  themselves.  In  view  of  the 
impudence  and  foolhardiness  of  most  people,  anyone 
who  possesses  any  kind  of  superiority  or  merit  will 
do  well  to  keep  his  eyes  fixed  on  it,  if  he  does  not 
want  it  to  be  entirely  forgotten;  for  if  a  man  is  good- 
natured  enough  to   ignore  his    own    privileges,  and 


70  THE  WISDOM   OF  LIFE. 

hob-nob  with  the  generality  of  other  people,  as  if  he 
were  quite  on  their  level,  they  will  be  sure  to  treat 
him,  frankly  and  candidly,  as  one  of  themselves. 
This  is  a  piece  of  advice  I  would  specially  offer  to 
those  whose  superiority  is  of  the  highest  kind — real 
superiority,  I  mean,  of  a  purely  personal  nature — 
which  cannot,  like  orders  and  titles,  appeal  to  the  eye 
or  ear  at  every  moment ;  as,  otherwise,  they  will  find 
that  familiarity  breeds  contempt,  or,  as  the  Romans 
used  to  say,  sus  Minervam.  Joke  with  a  slave,  and 
he'll  soon  show  his  heels,  is  an  excellent  Arabian 
proverb ;  nor  ought  we  to  despise  what  Horace  says, 

Sume  superbiam 
Qucesitam  meritis. 

— usurp  the  fame  }^ou  have  deserved.  No  doubt, 
when  modesty  was  ma  le  a  virtue,  it  was  a  very  ad- 
vantageous thing  for  the  fools ;  for  everybody  is 
expected  to  speak  of  himself  as  if  he  were  one.  This 
is  levelling  down  indeed !  for  it  comes  to  look  as  if 
there  were  nothing  but  fools  in  the  world. 

The  cheapest  sort  of  pride  is  national  pride  ;  for  if 
a  man  is  proud  of  his  own  nation,  it  argues  that  he 
has  no  qualities  of  his  own  of  which  he  can  be  proud; 
otherwise,  he  would  not  have  recourse  to  those  which 
he  shares  with  so  many  millions  of  his  fellow-men. 
The  man  who  is  endowed  with  important  personal 
qualities  will  be  only  too  ready  to  see  clearly  in  what 
respects  his  own  nation  falls  short,  since  their  failings 
will  be  constantly  before  his  eyes.  But  every  miser- 
able fool  who  has  nothing  at  all  of  which  he  can  be 


PRIDE.  71 

proud  adopts,  as  a  last  resource,  pride  in  the  nation 
to  which  he  belongs  ;  he  is  ready  and  glad  to  defer. d 
all  its  faults  and  follies  tooth  and  nail,  thus  re-im- 
bursing  himself  for  his  own  inferiority.  For  example, 
if  you  speak  of  the  stupid  and  degrading  bigotry  of 
the  English  nation  with  the  contempt  it  deserves,  you 
will  hardly  find  one  Englishman  in  fifty  to  agree  with 
you ;  but  if  there  should  be  one,  he  will  generally 
happen  to  be  an  intelligent  man. 

The  Germans  have  no  national  pride,  which  shows 
how  honest  they  are,  as  everybody  knows  !  and  how 
dishonest  are  those  who,  by  a  piece  of  ridiculous 
affectation,  pretend  that  they  are  proud  of  their  coun- 
try— the  Deutsche  Briider  and  the  demagogues  who 
flatter  the  mob  in  order  to  mislead  it.  I  have  heard 
it  said  that  gunpowder  was  invented  by  a  German. 
I  doubt  it.  Lichtenberg  asks,  Why  is  it  that  a  man 
who  is  not  a  German  does  not  care  about  pretending 
that  he  is  one;  and  that  if  he  makes  any  pretence 
at  all,  it  is  to  be  a  Frenchman  or  an  Englishman  ? 1 

However  that  may  be,  individuality  is  a  far  more 
important  thing  than  nationality,  and  in  any  given 
man  deserves  a  thousand-fold  more  consideration. 
And  since  you  cannot  speak  of  national  character 
without  referring  to  large  masses  of  people,  it  is  im- 
possible to  be  loud  in  your  praises  and  at  the  same 
time    honest.      National    character    is   only   another 

1  Translators  Note.  It  should  be  remembered  that  these 
remarks  were  -written  in  the  earlier  part  of  the  present  century, 
and  that  a  German  philosopher  now-a-days,  even  though  he 
were  as  apt  to  say  bitter  things  as  Schopenhauer,  could  hardly 
write  in  a  similar  strain. 


72  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

name  for  the  particular  form  which  the  littleness, 
perversity  and  baseness  of  mankind  take  in  every 
country.  If  we  become  disgusted  with  one,  we  praise 
another,  until  we  get  disgusted  with  this  too.  Ever}7 
nation  mocks  at  other  nations,  and  all  are  right. 

The  contents  of  this  chapter,  which  treats,  as  1 
have  said,  of  what  we  represent  in  the  world,  or  what 
we  are  in  the  eyes  of  others,  may  be  further  distri- 
buted under  three  heads  :  honour,  rank  and  fame. 

Section  3. — Rank. 

Let  us  take  rank  first,  as  it  may  be  dismissed  in  a 
few  words,  although  it  plays  an  important  part  in 
the  eyes  of  the  masses  and  of  the  philistines,  and  is  a 
most  useful  wheel  in  the  machinery  of  the  State. 

It  has  a  purely  conventional  value.  Strictly 
speaking,  it  is  a  sham  ;  its  method  is  to  exact  an 
artificial  respect,  and,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  the  whole 
thing  is  a  mere  farce. 

Orders,  it  may  be  said,  are  bills  of  exchange  drawn 
on  public  opinion,  and  the  measure  of  their  value  is 
the  credit  of  the  drawer.  Of  course,  as  a  substitute 
for  pensions,  they  save  the  State  a  good  deal  of 
money  ;  and,  besides,  they  serve  a  very  useful  purpose, 
if  they  are  distributed  with  discrimination  and  judg- 
ment. For  people  in  general  have  eyes  and  ears,  it  is 
true  ;  but  not  much  else,  very  little  judgment  indeed, 
or  even  memory.  There  are  many  services  to  the 
State  quite  beyond  the  range  of  their  understanding  ; 
others,  again,  are  appreciated  and  made  much  of  for  a 
time,  and  then  soon  forgotten.     It  seems  to  me,  there- 


\ 


HONOUR.  73 

fore,  very  proper,  that  a  cross  or  a  star  should 
proclaim  to  the  mass  of  people  always  and  every- 
where, This  man  is  not  like  you;  he  has  done 
something.  But  orders  lose  their  value  when  they 
are  distributed  unjustly,  or  without  due  selection,  or 
in  too  great  numbers :  a  prince  should  be  as  careful  in 
conferring  them  as  a  man  of  business  is  in  signing 
a  bill.  It  is  a  pleonasm  to  inscribe  on  any  order  for 
distinguished  service  ;  for  every  order  ought  to  be  for 
distinguished  service.     That  stands  to  reason. 

Section  4- — Honour. 

Honour  is  a  much  larger  question  than  rank,  and 
more  difficult  to  discuss.  Let  us  begin  by  trying  to 
define  it. 

If  I  were  to  say  Honour  is  external  conscience, 
and  conscience  is  inward  honour,  no  doubt  a  good 
many  people  would  assent ;  but  there  would  be  more 
show  than  reality  about  such  a  definition,  and  it 
would  hardly  go  to  the  root  of  the  matter.  I  prefer 
to  say,  Honour  is,  on  its  objective  side,  other  people's 
v  opinion  of  what  we  are  worth;  on  its  subjective  side, 
it  is  the  respect  we  pay  to  this  opinion.  From  the 
latter  point  of  view,  to  be  a  man  of  honour  is  to 
exercise  what  is  often  a  very  wholesome,  but  by  no 
means  a  purely  moral,  influence. 

The  feelings  of  honour  and  shame  exist  in  every 
man  who  is  not  utterly  depraved,  and  honour  is 
everywhere  recognised  as  something  particularly 
valuable.  The  reason  of  this  is  as  follows.  By  and 
in   himself  a   man   can   accomplish   very  little  ;    he 


74  The  wisdom  of  life. 

is  like  Robinson  Crusoe  on  a  desert  island.  It  is  only 
in  society  that  a  man's  powers  can  be  called  into  full 
activity.  He  very  soon  finds  this  out  when  his 
consciousness  begins  to  develop,  and  there  arises  in 
him  the  desire  to  be  looked  upon  as  a  useful  member 
of  society,  as  one,  that  is,  who  is  capable  of  playing 
his  part  as  a  man — pro  parte  virili — thereby  acquir- 
ing a  right  to  the  benefits  of  social  life.  Now,  to  be 
a  useful  member  of  society,  one  must  do  two  things : 
firstly,  what  everyone  is  expected  to  do  everywhere ; 
and,  secondly,  what  one's  own  particular  position  in  the 
world  demands  and  requires. 

But  a  man  soon  discovers  that  everything  de- 
pends upon  his  being  useful,  not  in  his  own  opinion, 
but  in  the  opinion  of  others ;  and  so  he  tries  his  best 
to  make  that  favourable  impression  upon  the  world, 
to  which  he  attaches  such  a  high  value.  Hence,  this 
primitive  and  innate  characteristic  of  human  nature, 
which  is  called  the  feeling  of  honour,  or,  under 
another  aspect,  the  feeling  of  shame — verecundia.  It 
is  this  which  brings  a  blush  to  his  cheek  at  the 
thought  of  having  suddenly  to  fall  in  the  estimation 
of  others,  even  when  he  knows  that  he  is  innocent, 
nay,  even  if  his  remissness  extends  to  no  absolute 
obligation,  but  only  to  one  which  he  has  taken  upon 
himself  of  his  own  free  will.  Conversely,  nothing  in 
life  gives  a  man  so  much  courage  as  the  attainment 
or  renewal  of  the  conviction  that  other  people  regard 
him  with  favour ;  because  it  means  that  everyone 
joins  to  give  him  help  and  protection,  which  is  an 
infinitely  stronger  bulwark  against  the  ills  of  life 
than  anything  he  can  do  himself. 


HONOUR. 


75 


The  variety  of  relations  in  which  a  man  can  stand 
to  other  people  so  as  to  obtain  their  confidence,  that  is, 
their  good  opinion,  gives  rise  to  a  distinction  between 
several  kinds  of  honour,  resting  chiefly  on  the 
different  bearings  that  meum  may  take  to  tuum ;  or, 
again,  on  the  performance  of  various  pledges;  or 
finally,  on  the  relation  of  the  sexes.  Hence,  there  are 
three  main  kinds  of  honour,  each  of  which  takes 
various  forms— civic  honour,  official  honour,  and 
sexual  honour. 

Civic  honour  has  the  widest  sphere  of  all.  It  con- 
sists in  the  assumption  that  we  shall  pay  uncondi- 
tional respect  to  the  rights  of  others,  and,  therefore, 
never  use  any  unjust  or  unlawful  means  of  getting 
what  we  want.  It  is  the  condition  of  all  peaceable 
intercourse  between  man  and  man ;  and  it  is  destroyed 
by  anything  that  openly  and  manifestly  militates 
against  this  peaceable  intercourse,  anything,  accord- 
ingly, which  entails  punishment  at  the  hands  of  the 
law,  always  supposing  that  the  punishment  is  a  just 


one. 


The  ultimate  foundation  of  honour  is  the  conviction 
that  moral  character  is  unalterable:  a  single  bad 
action  implies  that  future  actions  of  the  same  kind 
will,  under  similar  circumstances,  also  be  bad.  This 
is  well  expressed  by  the  English  use  of  the  word 
character  as  meaning  credit,  reputation,  honour. 
Hence  honour,  once  lost,  can  never  be  recovered  ;  un- 
less the  loss  rested  on  some  mistake,  such  as  may  occur 
if  a  man  is  slandered  or  his  actions  viewed  in  a  false 
light.  So  the  law  provides  remedies  against  slander, 
libel,  and  even  insult;  for  insult,  though  it  amount  to 


76  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

no  more  than  mere  abuse,  is  a  kind  of  summary  slander 
with  a  suppression  of  the  reasons.  What  I  mean  may 
be  well  put   in  the  Greek  phrase — not  quoted  from 

any    author — &mv   rj   XotSopta  Sia/SoXr)  (rvvrofxbs.       It  is 

true  that  if  a  man  abuses  another,  he  is  simply  show- 
ing that  he  has  no  real  or  true  causes  of  complaint 
against  him ;  as,  otherwise,  he  would  bring  these 
forward  as  the  premises,  and  rely  upon  his  hearers 
to  draw  the  conclusion  themselves ;  instead  of  which, 
he  gives  the  conclusion  and  leaves  out  the  premises, 
trusting  that  people  will  suppose  that  he  has  done  so 
only  for  the  sake  of  being  brief. 

Civic  honour  draws  its  existence  and  name  from 
the  middle  classes ;  but  it  applies  equally  to  all,  not 
excepting  the  highest.  No  man  can  disregard  it,  and 
it  is  a  very  serious  thing,  of  which  every  one  should 
be  careful  not  to  make  light.  The  man  who  breaks 
confidence  has  for  ever  forfeited  confidence,  whatever 
he  may  do,  and  whoever  he  may  be ;  and  the  bitter 
consequences  of  the  loss  of  confidence  can  never  be 
averted. 

There  is  a  sense  in  which  honour  may  be  said  to 
have  a  negative  character  in  opposition  to  the  positive 
character  of  fame.  For  honour  is  not  the  opinion 
people  have  of  particular  qualities  which  a  man  may 
happen  to  possess  exclusively :  it  is  rather  the  opinion 
they  have  of  the  qualities  which  a  man  may  be  ex- 
pected to  exhibit,  and  to  which  he  should  not  prove 
false.  Honour,  therefore,  means  that  a  man  is  not 
exceptional;  fame,  that  he  is.  Fame  is  something 
/which  must  be  won ;  honour,  only  something  which 
[must  not  be  lost.     The  absence  of  fame  is  obscurity, 


\ 


HONOUR.  77 

which  is  only  a  negative ;  but  loss  of  honour  is  shame, 
which  is  a  positive  quality.  This  negative  character 
of  honour  must  not  be  confused  with  any  thing  passive ; 
for  honour  is  above  all  things  active  in  its  working.  It 
is  the  only  quality  which  proceeds  directly  from  the 
man  who  exhibits  it :  it  is  concerned  entirely  with 
what  he  does  and  leaves  undone,  and  has  nothing  to 
do  with  the  actions  of  others  or  the  obstacles  they 
place  in  his  way.  It  is  something  entirely  in  our  own 
power — twv  £$rnio)v.  This  distinction,  as  we  shall  see 
presently,  marks  off  true  honour  from  the  sham  honour 
of  chivalry. 

Slander  is  the  only  weapon  by  which  honour  can  be 
attacked  from  without ;  and  the  only  way  to  repel 
the  attack  is  to  confute  the  slander  with  the  proper 
amount  of  publicity,  and  a  due  unmasking  of  him  who 
utters  it. 

The  reason  why  respect  is  paid  to  age  is  that  old 
people  have  necessarily  shown  in  the  course  of  their 
lives  whether  or  not  they  have  been  able  to  maintain 
their  honour  unblemished  ;  while  that  of  young  people 
has  not  yet  been  put  to  the  proof,  though  they  are 
credited  with  the  possession  of  it.  For  neither  length 
of  years, — equalled,  as  it  is,  and  even  excelled,  in  the 
case  of  some  of  the  lower  animals, — nor,  again,  experi- 
ence, which  is  only  a  closer  knowledge  of  the  world's 
ways,  can  be  any  sufficient  reason  for  the  respect 
which  the  young  are  everywhere  required  to  show 
towards  the  old :  for  if  it  were  merely  a  matter  of 
years,  the  weakness  which  attends  on  age  would  call 
rather  for  consideration  than  for  respect.  It  is,  how- 
ever, a  remarkable  fact  that  white  hair  always  com- 


\ 


78  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

mands  reverence — a  reverence  really  innate  and  in- 
stinctive. Wrinkles — a  much  surer  sign  of  old  age — 
command  no  reverence  at  all :  you  never  hear  any  one 
speak  of  venerable  wrinkles  ;  but  venerable  white  hair 
is  a  common  expression. 

Honour  has  only  an  indirect  value.  For,  as  I  ex- 
plained at  the  beginning  of  this  chapter,  what  other 
people  think  of  us,  if  it  affects  us  at  all,  can  affect  us 
only  in  so  far  as  it  governs  their  behaviour  towards 
us,  and  only  just  so  long  as  we  live  with,  or  have  to 
do  with,  them.  But  it  is  to  society  alone  that  we  owe 
that  safety  which  we  and  our  possessions  enjoy  in  a 
state  of  civilisation  ;  in  all  we  do  we  need  the  help  of 
others,  and  they,  in  their  turn,  must  have  confidence 
in  us  before  they  can  have  anything  to  do  with  us. 
Accordingly,  their  opinion  of  us  is,  indirectly,  a  matter 
of  great  importance  ;  though  I  cannot  see  how  it  can 
have  a  direct  or  immediate  value.  This  is  an  opinion 
also  held  by  Cicero,  I  quite  agree,  he  writes,  ivith 
what  Ghrysippus  and  Diogenes  used  to  say,  that  a 
good  reputation  is  not  worth  raising  a  finger  to  obtain, 
if  it  were  not  that  it  is  so  useful.1  This  truth  has 
been  insisted  upon  at  great  length  by  Helvetius  in  his 
chief  work  Be  VEsprit,2  the  conclusion  of  which  is 
that  we  love  esteem  not  for  its  own  sake,  but  solely  for 
the  advantages  which  it  brings.  And  as  the  means 
can  never  be  more  than  the  end,  that  saying,  of  which 
so  much  is  made,  Honour  is  dearer  than  life  itself  is, 
as  I  have  remarked,  a  very  exaggerated  statement. 
So  much,  then,  for  civic  honour. 


1  Definibus  iii.,  17. 


2  Disc:  iii.,  13. 


HONOUR.  79 

Official  honour  is  the  general  opinion  of  other 
people  that  a  man  who  fills  any  office  really  has  the 
necessary  qualities  for  the  proper  discharge  of  all  the 
duties  which  appertain  to  it.  The  greater  and  more 
important  the  duties  a  man  has  to  discharge  in  the 
State,  and  the  higher  and  more  influential  the  office 
which  he  fills,  the  stronger  must  be  the  opinion  which 
people  have  of  the  moral  and  intellectual  qualities 
which  render  him  fit  for  his  post.  Therefore,  the 
higher  his  position,  the  greater  must  be  the  degree  of 
honour  paid  to  him,  expressed,  as  it  is,  in  titles,  orders 
and  the  generally  subservient  behaviour  of  others 
towards  him.  As  a  rule,  a  man's  official  rank  implies 
the  particular  degree  of  honour  which  ought  to  be 
paid  to  him,  however  much  this  degree  may  be  modi- 
fied by  the  capacity  of  the  masses  to  form  any  notion 
of  its  importance.  Still,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  greater 
honour  is  paid  to  a  man  who  fulfils  special  duties 
than  to  the  common  citizen,  whose  honour  mainly 
consists  in  keeping  clear  of  dishonour. 

Official  honour  demands,  further,  that  the  man  who 
occupies  an  office  must  maintain  respect  for  it,  for  the 
sake  both  of  his  colleagues  and  of  those  who  will  come 
after  him.  This  respect  an  official  can  maintain  by  a 
proper  observance  of  his  duties,  and  by  repelling  any 
attack  that  may  be  made  upon  the  office  itself  or 
upon  its  occupant :  he  must  not,  for  instance,  pass 
over  unheeded  any  statement  to  the  effect  that  the 
duties  of  the  office  are  not  properly  discharged,  or  that 
the  office  itself  does  not  conduce  to  the  public  welfare. 
He  must  prove  the  unwarrantable  nature  of  such 
attacks  by  enforcing  the  legal  penalty  for  them. 


\ 


80  THE  WISDOM   OF  LIFE. 

Subordinate  to  the  honour  of  official  personages 
comes  that  of  those  who  serve  the  State  in  any  other 
capacity,  as  doctors,  lawyers,  teachers,  anyone,  in 
short,  who  by  graduating  in  any  subject,  or  by  any 
other  public  declaration  that  he  is  qualified  to  exer- 
cise some  special  skill,  claims  to  practise  it;  in  a 
word,  the  honour  of  all  those  who  take  any 
public  pledges  whatever.  Under  this  head  comes 
military  honour,  in  the  true  sense  of  the  word,  the 
opinion  that  people  who  have  bound  themselves  to 
defend  their  country  really  possess  the  requisite 
qualities  which  will  enable  them  to  do  so,  especially 
courage,  personal  bravery  and  strength,  and  that  they 
are  perfectly  ready  to  defend  their  country  to  the 
death,  and  never  and  under  no  circumstances  desert 
the  flag  to  which  they  have  once  sworn  allegiance.  I 
have  here  taken  official  honour  in  a  wider  sense  than 
that  in  which  it  is  generally  used,  namely,  the  respect 
due  by  citizens  to  an  office  itself. 

In  treating  of  sexual  honour  and  the  principles  on 
which  it  rests,  a  little  more  attention  and  analysis  are 
necessary  ;  and  what  I  shall  say  will  support  my  con- 
tention that  all  honour  really  rests  upon  a  utilitarian 
basis.  There  are  two  natural  divisions  of  the  subject 
— the  honour  of  women  and  the  honour  of  men,  in 
either  side  issuing  in  a  well-understood  esprit  de  corps. 
The  former  is  by  far  the  more  important  of  the  two, 
because  the  most  essential  feature  in  woman's  life  is 
her  relation  to  man. 

Female  honour  is  the  general  opinion  in  regard  to  a 
girl  that  she  is  pure,  and  in  regard  to  a  wife  that  she 
is  faithful.     The  importance  of  this  opinion  rests  upon 


HONOUR.  81 

the  following  considerations.  Women  depend  upon 
men  in  all  the  relations  of  life ;  men  upon  women,  it 
might  be  said,  in  one  only.  So  an  arrangement  is 
made  for  mutual  interdependence — man  undertaking 
responsibility  for  all  woman's  needs  and  also  for  the 
children  that  spring  from  their  union — an  arrange- 
ment on  which  is  based  the  welfare  of  the  whole 
female  race.  To  carry  out  this  plan,  women  have  to 
band  together  with  a  show  of  esprit  cle  corps,  and 
present  one  undivided  front  to  their  common  enemy, 
man, — who  possesses  all  the  good  things  of  the  earth,  in 
virtue  of  his  superior  physical  and  intellectual  power, — 
in  order  to  lay  siege  to  and  conquer  him,  and  so  get 
possession  of  him  and  a  share  of  those  good  things. 
To  this  end  the  honour  of  all  women  depends  upon 
the  enforcement  of  the  rule  that  no  woman  should  give 
herself  to  a  man  except  in  marriage,  in  order  that 
every  man  may  be  forced,  as  it  were,  to  surrender  and 
ally  himself  with  a  woman ;  by  this  arrangement  pro- 
vision is  made  for  the  whole  of  the  female  race.  This 
is  a  result,  however,  which  can  be  obtained  only  by  a 
strict  observance  of  the  rule  ;  and,  accordingly,  women 
everywhere  show  true  esprit  de  corps  in  carefully  in- 
sisting upon  its  maintenance.  Any  girl  who  commits 
a  breach  of  the  rule  betrays  the  whole  female  race, 
because  its  welfare  would  be  destroyed  if  every  woman 
were  to  do  likewise  ;  so  she  is  cast  out  with  shame  as 
one  who  has  lost  her  honour.  No  woman  will  have 
anything  more  to  do  with  her ;  she  is  avoided  like 
the  plague.  The  same  doom  is  awarded  to  a  woman 
who  breaks  the  marriage  tie  ;  for  in  so  doing  she  is 
false  to  the  terms  upon  which  the  man  capitulated; 


82  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

and  as  her  conduct  is  such  as  to  frighten  other  men 
from  making  a  similar  surrender,  it  imperils  the  wel- 
fare of  all  her  sisters.  Nay  more  ;  this  deception  and 
coarse  breach  of  troth  is  a  crime  punishable  by  the 
loss,  not  only  of  personal,  but  also  of  civic  honour. 
This  is  why  we  minimise  the  shame  of  a  girl,  but  not 
of  a  wife ;  because,  in  the  former  case,  marriage  can 
restore  honour,  while  in  the  latter,  no  atonement  can 
be  made  for  the  breach  of  contract. 

Once  this  esprit  de  corps  is  acknowledged  to  be  the 
foundation  of  female  honour,  and  is  seen  to  be  a 
wholesome,  nay,  a  necessary  arrangement,  as  at  bottom 
a  matter  of  prudence  and  interest,  its  extreme  import- 
ance for  the  welfare  of  women  will  be  recognised.  But 
it  does  not  possess  anything  more  than  a  relative 
value.  It  is  no  absolute  end,  lying  beyond  all  other 
aims  of  existence  and  valued  above  life  itself.  In 
this  view,  there  will  be  nothing  to  applaud  in  the 
forced  and  extravagant  conduct  of  a  Lucretia  or  a 
Virginius — conduct  which  can  easily  degenerate  into 
tragic  farce,  and  produce  a  terrible  feeling  of  revulsion. 
The  conclusion  of  Emilia  Galotti,  for  instance,  makes 
one  leave  the  theatre  completely  ill  at  ease ;  and,  on  the 
other  hand,  all  the  rules  of  female  honour  cannot  pre- 
vent a  certain  sympathy  with  Clara  in  Egmont.  To 
carry  this  principle  of  female  honour  too  far  is  to 
forget  the  end  in  thinking  of  the  means — and  this  is 
just  what  people  often  do;  for  such  exaggeration 
suggests  that  the  value  of  sexual  honour  is  absolute  ; 
while  the  truth  is  that  it  is  more  relative  than  any 
other  kind.  One  might  go  so  far  as  to  say  that  its 
value  is   purely   conventional,   when   one   sees  from 


HONOUR.  83 

Thomasius  how  in  all  ages  and  countries,  up  to  the 
time  of  the  Reformation,  irregularities  were  permitted 
and  recognised  by  law,  with  no  derogation  to  female 
honour, — not  to  speak  of  the  temple  of  Mylitta  at 
Babylon.1 

There  are  also,  of  course,  certain  circumstances  in 
civil  life  which  make  external  forms  of  marriage 
impossible,  especially  in  Catholic  countries,  where 
there  is  no  such  thing  as  divorce.  Ruling  princes 
everywhere,  would,  in  my  opinion,  do  much  better, 
from  a  moral  point  of  view,  to  dispense  with  forms 
altogether  rather  than  contract  a  morganatic  mar- 
riage, the  descendants  of  which  might  raise  claims  to 
the  throne  if  the  legitimate  stock  happened  to  die 
out ;  so  that  there  is  a  possibility,  though,  perhaps,  a 
remote  one,  that  a  morganatic  marriage  might  pro- 
duce a  civil  war.  And,  besides,  such  a  marriage, 
concluded  in  defiance  of  all  outward  ceremony,  is  a 
concession  made  to  women  and  priests — two  classes  of 
persons  to  whom  one  should  be  most  careful  to  give 
as  little  tether  as  possible.  It  is  further  to  be  re- 
marked that  every  man  in  a  country  can  marry  the 
woman  of  his  choice,  except  one  poor  individual, 
namely,  the  prince.  His  hand  belongs  to  his  country, 
and  can  bo  given  in  marriage  only  for  reasons  of 
State,  that  is,  for  the  good  of  the  country.  Still,  for 
all  that,  he  is  a  man;  and,  as  a  man,  he  likes  to  follow 
whither  his  heart  leads,  It  is  an  unjust,  ungrateful 
and  priggish  thing  to  forbid,  or  to  desire  to  forbid,  a 
prince  from  following  his  inclinations  in  this  matter ; 
of  course,  as  long  as  the  lady  has  no  influence  upon 
1  Perodotus,  i.  199. 


84  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

the  Government  of  the  country.  From  her  point  of 
view  she  occupies  an  exceptional  position,  and  does 
not  come  under  the  ordinary  rules  of  sexual  honour  ; 
for  she  has  merely  given  herself  to  a  man  who  loves 
her,  and  whom  she  loves  but  cannot  marry.  And  in 
general,  the  fact  that  the  principle  of  female  honour 
has  no  origin  in  nature,  is  shown  by  the  many  bloody 
sacrifices  which  have  been  offered  to  it, — the  murder 
of  children  and  the  mother's  suicide.  No  doubt  a  girl 
who  contravenes  the  code  commits  a  breach  of  faith 
against  her  whole  sex ;  but  this  faith  is  one  which  is 
only  secretly  taken  for  granted,  and  not  sworn  to. 
And  since,  in  most  cases,  her  own  prospects  suffer 
most  immediately,  her  folly  is  infinitely  greater  than 
her  crime. 

The  corresponding  virtue  in  men  is  a  product  of 
the  one  I  have  been  discussing.  It  is  their  esprit  de 
corps,  which  demands  that,  when  a  man  has  made  that 
surrender  of  himself  in  marriage  which  is  so  advan- 
tageous to  his  conqueror,  he  shall  take  care  that  the 
terms  of  the  treaty  are  maintained;  both  in  order 
that  the  agreement  itself  may  lose  none  of  its  force 
by  the  permission  of  any  laxity  in  its  observance,  and 
that  men,  having  given  up  everything,  may,  at  least, 
be  assured  of  their  bargain,  namely,  exclusive  posses- 
sion. Accordingly,  it  is  part  of  a  man's  honour  to 
resent  a  breach  of  the  marriage  tie  on  the  part  of  his 
wife,  and  to  punish  it,  at  the  very  least  by  separating 
from  her.  If  he  condones  the  offence,  his  fellow-men 
cry  shame  upon  him ;  but  the  shame  in  this  case  is 
not  nearly  so  foul  as  that  of  the  woman  who  has  lost 
her  honour ;  the  stain  is  by  no  means  of  so  deep  a 


HONOUR.  85 

dye — levioris  notae  macula; — because  a  man's  relation 
to  woman  is  subordinate  to  many  other  and  more 
important  affairs  in  his  life.  The  two  great  dramatic 
poets  of  modern  times  have  each  taken  man's  honour 
as  the  theme  of  two  plays ;  Shakespeare  in  Othello 
and  The  Winter's  Tale,  and  Calderon  in  El  medico  de 
su  honra,  (the  Physician  of  his  Honour),  and  A  secreto 
agravio  secreta  venganza,  (for  Secret  Insult  Secret 
Vengeance).  It  should  be  said,  however,  that  honour 
demands  the  punishment  of  the  wife  only  ;  to  punish 
her  paramour  too,  is  a  work  of  supererogation.  This 
confirms  the  view  I  have  taken,  that  a  man's  honour 
originates  in  esprit  de  corps. 

The  kind  of  honour  which  I  have  been  discussing 
hitherto  has  always  existed  in  its  various  forms  and 
principles  amongst  all  nations  and  at  all  times ; 
although  the  history  of  female  honour  shows  that  its 
principles  have  undergone  certain  local  modifications 
at  different  periods.  But  there  is  another  species  of 
honour  which  differs  from  this  entirely,  a  species  of 
honour  of  which  the  Greeks  and  Romans  had  no  con- 
ception, and  up  to  this  day  it  is  perfectly  unknown 
amongst  Chinese,  Hindoos  or  Mohammedans.  It  is  a 
kind  of  honour  which  arose  only  in  the  Middle  Age, 
and  is  indigenous  only  to  Christian  Europe,  nay,  only 
to  an  extremely  small  portion  of  the  population,  that 
is  to  say,  the  higher  classes  of  society  and  those  who 
ape  them.  It  is  knightly  honour,  or  point  d'honneur. 
Its  principles  are  quite  different  from  those  which 
underlie  the  kind  of  honour  I  have  been  treating 
until  now,  and  in  some  respects  are  even  opposed  to 
them.      The   sort   I   am   referring   to    produces    the 


86  ->"  THE  WISDOM  OP  LIFE. 

cavalier;  while  the  other  kind  creates  the  man  of 
honour.  As  this  is  so,  I  shall  proceed  to  give  an 
explanation  of  its  principles,  as  a  kind  of  code  or 
mirror  of  knightly  courtesy. 

(1.)  To  begin  with,  honour  of  this  sort  consists,  not 
in  other  people's  opinion  of  what  we  are  worth,  but 
wholly  and  entirely  in  whether  they  express  it  or  not, 
no  matter  whether  they  really  have  any  opinion  at  all, 
let  alone  whether  they  know  of  reasons  for  having 
one.  Other  people  may  entertain  the  worst  opinion 
of  us  in  consequence  of  what  we  do,  and  may  despise 
us  as  much  as  they  like ;  so  long  as  no  one  dares  to 
give  expression  to  his  opinion,  our  honour  remains 
untarnished.  So  if  our  actions  and  qualities  compel 
the  highest  respect  from  other  people,  and  they  have 
no  option  but  to  give  this  respect, — as  soon  as  anyone, 
no  matter  how  wicked  or  foolish  he  may  be,  utters 
something  depreciatory  of  us,  our  honour  is  offended, 
nay,  gone  for  ever,  unless  we  can  manage  to  restore  it 
A  superfluous  proof  of  what  I  say,  namely,  that 
knightly  honour  depends,  not  upon  what  people  think, 
but  upon  what  they  say,  is  furnished  by  the  fact  that 
insults  can  be  withdrawn,  or,  if  necessary,  form  the 
subject  of  an  apology,  which  makes  them  as  though 
they  had  never  been  uttered.  Whether  the  opinion 
which  underlay  the  expression  has  also  been  rectified, 
and  why  the  expression  should  ever  have  been  used, 
are  questions  which  are  perfectly  unimportant :  so 
long  as  the  statement  is  withdrawn,  all  is  well.  The 
truth  is  that  conduct  of  this  kind  aims,  not  at  earning 
respect,  but  at  extorting  it. 

(2.)  In  the  second  place,  this  sort  of  honour  rests, 


HONOUR.  87 

not  on  what  a  man  does,  but  on  what  he  suffers,  the 
obstacles  he  encounters ;  differing  from  the  honour 
which  prevails  in  all  else,  in  consisting,  not  in  what 
he  says  or  does  himself,  but  in  what  another  man  says 
or  does.  His  honour  is  thus  at  the  mercy  of  every 
man  who  can  talk  it  away  on  the  tip  of  his  tongue ; 
and  if  he  attacks  it,  in  a  moment  it  is  gone  for  ever, — 
unless  the  man  who  is  attacked  manages  to  wrest  it 
back  again  by  a  process  which  I  shall  mention  pre- 
sently, a  process  which  involves  danger  to  his  life, 
health,  freedom,  property  and  peace  of  mind.  A 
man's  whole  conduct  may  be  in  accordance  with  th^ 
most  righteous  and  noble  principles,  his  spirit  may  be 
the  purest  that  ever  breathed,  his  intellect  of  the  very 
highest  order ;  and  yet  his  honour  may  disappear  the 
moment  that  anyone  is  pleased  to  insult  him,  anyone 
at  all  who  has  not  offended  against  this  code  of  honour 
himself,  let  him  be  the  most  worthless  rascal  or  the 
most  stupid  beast,  an  idler,  gambler,  debtor,  a  man,  in 
short,  of  no  account  at  all.  It  is  usually  this  sort  of 
fellow  who  likes  to  insult  people ;  for,  as  Seneca1 
rightly  remarks,  ut  quisque  contemtissimus  et  ludibrio 
est,  ita  sol'iitissimce  iinguce  est — the  more  contemptible 
and  ridiculous  a  man  is,  the  readier  he  is  with  his 
tongue.  His  insults  are  most  likely  to  be  directed 
against  the  very  kind  of  man  I  have  described,  because 
people  of  different  tastes  can  never  be  friends,  and  the 
sight  of  pre-eminent  merit  is  apt  to  raise  the  secret  ire 
of  a  ne'er-do-well.  What  Goethe  says  in  the  West- 
ostlicher  Divan  is  quite  true,  that  it  is  useless  to  com- 
plain against  your  enemies ;  for  they  can  never 
1  De  Constantia,  11. 


88  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

become  your  friends,  if  your  whole  being  is  a  standing 
reproach  to  them : — 

Was  Hagst  du  iiber  Feinde  ? 
Sollten  fiolcheje  werden  Freunde 
Denen  das  Wesen,  wie  du  bist, 
Ira  stillen  ein  euriger  Vorwurf  ist  ? 

It  is  obvious  that  people  of  this  worthless  descrip- 
tion have  good  cause  to  be  thankful  to  the  principle 
of  honour,  because  it  puts  them  on  a  level  with  people 
who  in  every  other  respect  stand  far  above  them.  If 
a  fellow  likes  to  insult  any  one,  attribute  to  him,  for 
example,  some  bad  quality,  this  is  taken  prima  facie 
as  a  well-founded  opinion,  true  in  fact ;  a  decree,  as  it 
were,  with  all  the  force  of  law ;  nay,  if  it  is  not  at 
once  wiped  out  in  blood,  it  is  a  judgment  which 
holds  good  and  valid  to  all  time.  In  other  words,  the 
man  who  is  insulted  remains — in  the  eyes  of  all 
honourable  people — what  the  man  who  uttered  the 
insult — even  though  he  were  the  greatest  wretch  on 
earth — was  pleased  to  call  him;  for  he  h&s  put  up 
with  the  insult  —  the  technical  term,  I  believe. 
Accordingly,  all  honourable  people  will  have  nothing 
more  to  do  with  him,  and  treat  him  like  a  leper,  and, 
it  may  be,  refuse  to  go  into  any  company  where  he 
may  be  found,  and  so  on. 

This  wise  proceeding  may,  I  think,  be  traced  back 
to  the  fact  that  in  the  Middle  Age,  up  to  the  fifteenth 
century,  it  was  not  the  accuser  in  any  criminal 
process  who  had  to  prove  the  guilt  of  the  accused,  but 
the  accused  who  had  to  prove  his  innocence.1     This 

1  See  C.  G.  von  Wachter's  Beitrage  zur  deutschen  GeschicJde^ 
especially  the  chapter  on  criminal  law. 


HONOUR.  89 

he  could  do  by  swearing  he  was  not  guilty ;  and  his 
backers — consacramentales — had  to  come  and  swear 
that  in  their  opinion  he  was  incapable  of  perjury.  If 
he  could  find  no  one  to  help  him  in  this  way,  or  the 
accuser  took  objection  to  his  backers,  recourse  was 
had  to  trial  by  the  Judgment  of  God,  which  generally 
meant  a  duel.  For  the  accused  was  now  in  disgrace,1 
and  had  to  clear  himself.  Here,  then,  is  the  origin  of 
the  notion  of  disgrace,  and  of  that  whole  system 
which  prevails  now-a-days  amongst  honourable  people, 
— only  that  the  oath  is  omitted.  This  is  also  the 
explanation  of  that  deep  feeling  of  indignation  which 
honourable  people  are  called  upon  to  show  if  they  are 
given  the  lie ;  it  is  a  reproach  which  they  say  must 
be  wiped  out  in  blood.  It  seldom  comes  to  this 
pass,  however,  though  lies  are  of  common  occur- 
rence ;  but  in  England,  more  than  elsewhere,  it  is  a 
superstition  which  has  taken  very  deep  root.  As  a 
matter  of  order,  a  man  who  threatens  to  kill  another 
for  telling  a  lie  should  never  have  told  one  himself. 
The  fact  is,  that  the  criminal  trial  of  the  Middle  Age 
also  admitted  of  a  shorter  form.  In  reply  to  the  charge, 
the  accused  answered:  That  is  a  lie;  whereupon  it  was 
left  to  be  decided  by  the  Judgment  of  God.  Hence, 
the  code  of  knightly  honour  prescribes  that,  when  the 
lie  is  given,  an  appeal  to  arms  follows  as  a  matter  of 
course.  So  much,  then,  for  the  theory  of  insult. 
But  there  is   something  even   worse  than   insult, 

1  Translatcn^s  Note.  It  is  true  that  this  expression  has 
another  and  special  meaning  in  the  technical  terminology  of 
Chivalry,  but  it  is  the  nearest  English  equivalent  which  I  can  find 
for  the  German— ein  Bescholtetier. 


90  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

something  so  dreadful  that  I  must  beg  pardon  of  all 
honourable  people  for  so  much  as  mentioning  it  in 
this  code  of  knightly  honour ;  for  I  know  they  will 
shiver,  and  their  hair  will  stand  on  end,  at  the  very 
thought  of  it — the  summuwn  malum,  the  greatest  evil 
on  earth,  worse  than  death  and  damnation.  A  man 
may  give  another — korribile  dictu! — a  slap  or  a  blow. 
This  is  such  an  awful  thing,  and  so  utterly  fatal  to  all 
honour,  that,  while  any  other  species  of  insult  may  be 
healed  by  blood-letting,  this  can  be  cured  only  by  the 
coup-  de-  grace. 

(3.)  In  the  third  place,  this  kind  of  honour  has 
absolutely  nothing  to  do  with  what  a  man  may  be  in 
and  for  himself ;  or,  again,  with  the  question  whether 
his  moral  character  can  ever  become  better  or  worse, 
and  ail  such  pedantic  inquiries.  If  your  honour 
happens  to  be  attacked,  or  to  all  appearances  gone,  it 
can  very  soon  be  restored  in  its  entirety  if  you  are 
only  quick  enough  in  having  recourse  to  the  one 
universal  remedy — a  duel.  But  if  the  aggressor  does 
not  belong  to  the  classes  which  recognise  the  code  of 
knightly  honour,  or  has  himself  once  offended  against 
it,  there  is  a  safer  way  of  meeting  any  attack  upon 
your  honour,  whether  it  consists  in  blows,  or  merely 
in  words.  If  you  are  armed,  you  can  strike  down 
your  opponent  on  the  spot,  or  perhaps  an  hour  later. 
This  will  restore  your  honour. 

But  if  you  wish  to  avoid  such  an  extreme  step,  from 
fear  of  any  unpleasant  consequences  arising  therefrom, 
or  from  uncertainty  as  to  whether  the  aggressor  is 
subject  to  the  laws  of  knightly  honour  or  not,  there  is 
another  means  of  making  your  position  good,  namely, 


s  HONOUR.  91 

the  Avantage.  This  consists  in  returning  rudeness 
with  still  greater  rudeness ;  and  if  insults  are  no  use, 
you  can  try  a  blow,  which  forms  a  sort  of  climax  in 
the  redemption  of  your  honour ;  for  instance,  a  box 
on  the  ear  may  be  cured  by  a  blow  with  a  stick,  and 
a  blow  with  a  stick  by  a  thrashing  with  a  horsewhip  ; 
and,  as  the  approved  remedy  for  this  last,  some  people 
recommend  you  to  spit  at  your  opponent.1  If  all 
these  means  are  of  no  avail,  you  must  not  shrink  from 
drawing  blood.  And  the  reason  for  these  methods  of 
wiping  out  insult  is,  in  this  code,  as  follows : 

(4.)  To  receive  an  insult  is  disgraceful ;  to  give  one, 
honourable.  Let  me  take  an  example.  My  opponent 
has  truth,  right  and  reason  on  his  side.  Very  well. 
I  insult  him.  Thereupon  right  and  honour  leave  him 
and  come  to  me,  and,  for  the  time  being,  he  has  lost 
them — until  he  gets  them  back,  not  by  the  exercise  of 
right  or  reason,  but  by  shooting  and  sticking  me. 
Accordingly,  rudeness  is  a  quality  which,  in  point  of 
honour,  is  a  substitute  for  any  other  and  outweighs 
them  all.  The  rudest  is  always  right.  What  more 
do  you  want  ?  However  stupid,  bad  or  wicked  a  man 
may  have  been,  if  he  is  only  rude  into  the  bargain,  he 
condones  and  legitimises  all  his  faults.  If  in  any 
discussion  or  conversation,  another  man  shows  more 
knowledge,  greater  love  of  truth,  a  sounder  judgment, 
better  understanding  than  we,  or  generally  exhibits 
intellectual  qualities  which  cast  ours  into  the  shade, 

1  Translator's  Note.  It  must  be  remembered  that  Schopen- 
hauer is  here  describing,  or  perhaps  caricaturing,  the  manners 
and  customs  of  the  German  aristocracy  of  half  a  century  ago. 
Now,  of  course,  nous  avons  change  tout  cela  I 


92  THE  WISDOM   OF  LIFE. 

we  can  at  once  annul  his  superiority  and  our  own 
shallowness,  and  in  our  turn  be  superior  to  him,  by 
being  insulting  and  offensive.  For  rudeness  is  better 
'than  any  argument ;  it  totally  eclipses  intellect.  If 
our  opponent  does  not  care  for  our  mode  of  attack, 
and  will  not  answer  still  more  rudely,  so  as  to  plunge 
us  into  the  ignoble  rivalry  of  the  Avantage,  we 
are  the  victors  and  honour  is  on  our  side.  Truth, 
knowledge,  understanding,  intellect,  wit,  must  beat 
a  retreat  and  leave  the  field  to  this  almighty 
insolence. 

Honourable  people  immediately  make  a  show  of 
mounting  their  war-horse,  if  anyone  utters  an  opinion 
adverse  to  theirs,  or  shows  more  intelligence  than  they 
can  muster ;  and  if  in  any  controversy  they  are  at 
a  loss  for  a  reply,  they  look  about  for  some  weapon  of 
rudeness,  which  will  serve  as  well  and  come  readier  to 
hand ;  so  they  retire  masters  of  the  position.  It  must 
now  be  obvious  that  people  are  quite  right  in  applaud- 
ing this  principle  of  honour  as  having  ennobled  the 
tone  of  society.  This  principle  springs  from  another, 
which  forms  the  heart  and  soul  of  the  entire  code. 

(5.)  Fifthly,  the  code  implies  that  the  highest  court 
to  which  a  man  can  appeal  in  any  differences  he  may 
have  with  another  on  a  point  of  honour  is  the  court 
of  physical  force,  that  is,  of  brutality.  Every  piece  of 
rudeness  is,  strictly  speaking,  an  appeal  to  brutality  ; 
for  it  is  a  declaration  that  intellectual  strength  and 
moral  insight  are  incompetent  to  decide,  and  that  the 
battle  must  be  fought  out  by  physical  force — a 
struggle  which,  in  the  case  of  man,  whom  Franklin 
defines  as  a  tool-making  animal,  is  decided  by  the 


HONOUR.  93 

weapons  peculiar  to  the  species ;  and  the  decision  is 
irrevocable.  This  is  the  well-known  principle  of  the 
right  of  might — irony,  of  course,  like  the  wit  of  a  fool, 
a  parallel  phrase.  The  honour  of  a  knight  may  be 
called  the  glory  of  might. 

(6.)  Lastly,  if,  as  we  saw  above,  civic  honour  is  very 
scrupulous  in  the  matter  of  meum  and  tuum,  paying 
great  respect  to  obligations  and  a  promise  once  made, 
the  code  we  are  here  discussing  displays,  on  the  other 
hand,  the  noblest  liberality.  There  is  only  one  word 
which  may  not  be  broken,  the  word  of  honour — upon 
my  honour,  as  people  say — the  presumption  being,  of 
course,  that  every  other  form  of  promise  may  be  broken. 
Nay,  if  the  worst  comes  to  the  worst,  it  is  easy  to  break 
even  one's  word  of  honour,  and  still  remain  honour- 
able— again  by  adopting  that  universal  remedy,  the 
duel,  and  fighting  with  those  who  maintain  that  we 
pledged  our  word.  Further,  there  is  one  debt,  and 
one  alone,  that  under  no  circumstances  must  be  left 
unpaid — a  gambling  debt,  which  has  accordingly  been 
called  a  debt  of  honour.  In  all  other  kinds  of  debt  you 
may  cheat  Jews  and  Christians  are  much  as  you 
like;  and  your  knightly  honour  remains  without  a 
stain. 

The  unprejudiced  reader  will  see  at  once  that  such 
a  strange,  savage  and  ridiculous  code  of  honour  as 
this  has  no  foundation  in  human  nature,  nor  any 
warrant  in  a  healthy  view  of  human  affairs.  The 
extremely  narrow  sphere  of  its  operation  serves  only 
to  intensify  the  feeling,  which  is  exclusively  confined 
to  Europe  since  the  Middle  Age,  and  then  only  to  the 
upper  classes,  officers  and  soldiei's,  and  people  who 


94  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

imitate  them.  Neither  Greeks  nor  Romans  knew 
anything  of  this  code  of  honour  or  of  its  principles  ; 
nor  the  highly  civilised  nations  of  Asia,  ancient  or 
modern.  Amongst  them  no  other  kind  of  honour  is 
recognised  but  that  which  I  discussed  first,  in  virtue 
of  which  a  man  is  what  he  shows  himself  to  be  by  his 
actions,  not  what  any  wagging  tongue  is  pleased  to 
say  of  him.  They  thought  that  what  a  man  said  or 
did  might  perhaps  affect  his  own  honour,  but  not  any 
other  man's.  To  them,  a  blow  was  but  a  blow — and 
any  horse  or  donkey  could  give  a  harder  one — a  blow 
which  under  certain  circumstances  might  make  a  man 
angry  and  demand  immediate  vengeance ;  but  it  had 
nothing  to  do  with  honour.  No  one  kept  account  of 
blows  or  insulting  words,  or  of  the  satisfaction  which 
was  demanded  or  omitted  to  be  demanded.  Yet  in 
personal  bravery  and  contempt  of  death,  the  ancients 
were  certainly  not  inferior  to  the  nations  of  Christian 
Europe,  The  Greeks  and  Romans  were  thorough 
heroes,  if  you  like*  but  they  knew  nothing  about 
point  d'honneur,  If  they  had  any  idea  of  a  duel,  it 
was  totally  unconnected  with  the  life  of  the  nobles  ; 
it  was  merely  the  exhibition  of  mercenary  gladiators, 
slaves  devoted  to  slaughter,  condemned  criminals, 
who,  alternately  with  wild  beasts,  were  set  to  butcher 
one  another  to  make  a  Roman  holiday,  When  Ghris^ 
tianity  was  introduced,  gladiatorial  shows  were  done 
away  with,  and  their  place  taken,  in  Christian  times, 
by  the  duel,  which  was  a  way  of  settling  difficulties 
by  the  Judgment  of  God.  If  the  gladiatorial  fight  was 
a  cruel  sacrifice  to  the  prevailing  desire  for  great 
spectacles,  duelling  is  a  cruel  sacrifice  to  existing  pre- 


HONOUR.  95 

judices — a    sacrifice,    not    of    criminals,    slaves    and 
prisoners,  but  of  the  noble  and  the  free.1 

There  are  a  great  many  traits  in  the  character  of 
the  ancients  which  show  that  they  were  entirely  free 
from  these  prejudices.  When,  for  instance,  Marius 
was  summoned  to  a  duel  by  a  Teutonic  chief,  he  re- 
turned answer  to  the  effect  that,  if  the  chief  were 
tired  of  his  life,  he  might  go  and  hang  himself ;  at 
the  same  time  he  offered  him  a  veteran  gladiator  for 
a  round  or  two.  Plutarch  relates  in  his  life  of  The- 
mistocles  that  Eurybiades,  who  was  in  command  of 
the  fleet,  once  raised  his  stick  to  strike  him  ;  where- 
upon Themistocles,  instead  of  drawing  his  sword, 
simply  said:  Strike,  but  hear  one.  How  sorry  the 
reader  must  be,  if  he  is  an  honourable  man,  to  find 
that  we  have  no  information  that  the  Athenian 
officers  refused  in  a  body  to  serve  any  longer  under 
Themistocles,  if  he  acted  like  that !  There  is  a  modern 
French  writer  who  declares  that  if  anyone  considers 
Demosthenes  a  man  of  honour,  his  ignorance  will  ex- 
cite a  smile  of  pity  ;  and  that  Cicero  was  not  a  man 
of  honour  either ! 2  In  a  certain  passage  in  Plato's 
Laws,3  the  philosopher  speaks  at  length  of  cu'/aa  or 
assault,  showing  us  clearly  enough  that  the  ancients 
had  no  notion  of  any  feeling  of  honour  in  connection 
with  such  matters.  Socrates'  frequent  discussions 
were  often  followed  by  his  being  severely  handled, 

1  Translator's  Note.  These  and  other  remarks  on  duelling 
will  no  doubt  wear  a  belated  look  to  English  readers  ;  but  they 
are  hardly  yet  antiquated  for  most  parts  of  the  Continent. 

2  Soirees  litteraires :  par  C.  Durand.     Rouen,  1828. 
s  £k,  IX. 


\ 


96  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

and  he  bore  it  all  mildly.  Once,  for  instance,  when 
somebody  kicked  him,  the  patience  with  which  he 
took  the  insult  surprised  one  of  his  friends.  Do  you 
think,  said  Socrates,  that  if  an  ass  happened  to  kick  me, 
I  should  resent  it  ? 1  On  another  occasion,  when  he 
was  asked,  Has  not  that  fellow  abused  and  insulted  you  ? 
No,  was  his  answer,  what  he  says  is  not  addressed  to 
me.2  Stobaeus  has  preserved  a  long  passage  from 
Musonius,  from  which  we  can  see  how  the  ancients 
treated  insults.  They  knew  no  other  form  of  satis- 
faction than  that  which  the  law  provided,  and  wise 
people  despised  even  this.  If  a  Greek  received  a  box 
on  the  ear,  he  could  get  satisfaction  by  the  aid  of  the 
law ;  as  is  evident  from  Plato's  Gorgias,  where 
Socrates'  opinion  may  be  found.  The  same  thing 
may  be  seen  in  the  account  given  by  Gellius  of  one 
Lucius  Veratius,  who  had  the  audacity  to  give  some 
Roman  citizens  whom  he  met  on  the  road  a  box  on 
the  ear,  without  any  provocation  whatever;  but  to  avoid 
any  ulterior  consequences,  he  told  a  slave  to  bring  a 
bag  of  small  money,  and  on  the  spot  paid  the  trivial 
legal  penalty  to  the  men  whom  he  had  astonished  by 
his  conduct. 

Crates,  the  celebrated  Cynic  philosopher,  got  such 
a  box  on  the  ear  from  Nicodromus,  the  musician,  that 
his  face  swelled  up  and  became  black  and  blue; 
whereupon  he  put  a  label  on  his  forehead,  with  the 
inscription,  Nicodromus  fecit,  which  brought  much 
disgrace  to  the  fluteplayer  who  had  committed  such 
a  piece  of  brutality  upon  the  man  whom  all  Athens 

1  Diogenes  Laertius,  ii.,  21. 
3  Ibid  3G. 


HONOUR.  97 

honoured  as  a  household  god.1  And  in  a  letter  to 
Melesippus,  Diogenes  of  Sinope  tells  us  that  he  got  a 
beating  from  the  drunken  sons  of  the  Athenians  ;  but 
he  adds  that  it  was  a  matter  of  no  importance.2  And 
Seneca  devotes  the  last  few  chapters  of  his  Be  Con- 
stantia  to  a  lengthy  discussion  on  insult — contumelia; 
in  order  to  show  that  a  wise  man  will  take  no  notice 
of  it.  In  Chapter  XIV.  he  says,  What  shall  a  wise 
man  do,  if  he  i$  given  a  blow  ?  What  Cato  did,  when 
sortie  one  struolc  him  on  the  mouth ; — not  fire  up  or 
avenge  the  insult,  or  even  return  the  blow,  but  simply 
ignore  it. 

Yes,  you  say,  but  these  men  were  philosophers. — And 
you  are  fools,  eh  ?     Precisely. 

It  is  clear  that  the  whole  code  of  knightly  honour 
was  utterly  unknown  to  the  ancients  ;  for  the  simple 
reason  that  they  always  took  a  natural  and  unpre- 
judiced view  of  human  affairs,  and  did  not  allow 
themselves  to  be  influenced  by  any  such  vicious  and 
abominable  folly.  A  blow  in  the  face  was  to  them  a 
blow  and  nothing  more,  a  trivial  physical  injury  ; 
whereas  the  moderns  make  a  catastrophe  out  of  it,  a 
theme  for  a  tragedy ;  as,  for  instance,  in  the  Cid  of 
Corneille,  or  in  a  recent  German  comedy  of  middle- 
class  life,  called  The  Power  of  Circumstance,  which 
should  have  been  entitled  The  Power  of  Prejudice.  If  a 
member  of  the  National  Assembly  at  Paris  got  a  blow 
on  the  ear,  it  would  resound  from  one  end  of  Europe 
to  the  other.  The  examples  which  I  have  given  of 
ihe  way  in  which  such  an  occurrence  would  have  been 

1  Diogenes  Laertius,  vi.  87,  and  Apul :  Flor :  p.  126. 
*  Cf.  Casaubon's  Note,  ad  Diog.  Laert.,  vi.  33. 


98  THE   WISDOM   OF   LIFE. 

treated  in  classic  times  may  not  suit  the  ideas  of 
honourable  'people;  so  let  me  recommend  to  their 
notice,  as  a  kind  of  antidote,  the  story  of  Monsieur 
Desglands  in  Diderot's  masterpiece,  Jacques  le  fata- 
liste.  It  is  an  excellent  specimen  of  modern  knightly 
honour,  which,  no  doubt,  they  will  find  enjoyable  and 
edifying.1 

From  what  I  have  said  it  must  be  quite  evident 
that  the  principle  of  knightly  honour  has  no  essential 
and  spontaneous  origin  in  human  nature.  It  is  an 
artificial  product,  and  its  source  is  not  hard  to  find. 
Its  existence  obviously  dates  from  the  time  when 
people  used  their  fists  more  than  their  heads,  when 
priestcraft  had  enchained  the  human  intellect,  the 
much  bepraised  Middle  Age,  with  its  system  of 
chivalry.     That  was  the  time  when  people  let  the 

1  Translator's  Note,  The  story  to  which  Schopenhauer  here 
refers  is  briefly  as  follows  :  Two  gentlemen,  one  of  whom  was 
named  Desglands,  were  paying  court  to  the  same  lady.  As 
they  sat  at  table  side  by  side,  with  the  lady  opposite,  Desglands 
did  his  best  to  charm  her  with  his  conversation ;  but  she  pre- 
tended not  to  hear  him,  and  kept  looking  at  his  rival.  In  the 
agony  of  jealousy,  Desglands,  as  he  was  holding  a  fresh  egg  in  his 
hand,  involuntarily  crushed  it ;  the  shell  broke,  and  its  contents 
bespattered  his  rival's  face.  Seeing  him  raise  his  hand,  Des- 
glands seized  it  and  whispered  :  Sir,  I  take  it  as  given.  The 
next  day  Desglands  appeared  with  a  large  piece  of  black  stick- 
ing-plaster upon  his  right  cheek.  In  the  duel  which  followed, 
Desglands  severely  wounded  his  rival  ;  upon  which  he  reduced 
the  size  of  the  plaster.  When  his  rival  recovered,  they  had 
another  duel ;  Desglands  drew  blood  again,  and  again  made  his 
plaster  a  little  smaller  ;  and  so  on  for  five  or  six  times.  After 
every  duel  Desglands'  plaster  grew  less  and  less,  until  at  last  his 
rival  was  killed. 


HONOUR,  99 

Almighty  not  only  care  for  them  but  judge  for  them 
too  ;  when  difficult  cases  were  decided  by  an  ordeal,  a 
Judgment  of  God;  which,  with  few  exceptions,  meant 
a  duel,  not  only  where  nobles  were  concerned,  but  in 
the  case  of  ordinary  citizens  as  welL  There  is  a  neat 
illustration  of  this  in  Shakespeare's  Henry  VI.1 
Every  judicial  sentence  was  subject  to  an  appeal  to 
arms — a  court,  as  it  were,  of  higher  instance,  namely, 
the  Judgment  of  God:  and  this  really  meant  thai- 
physical  strength  and  activity,  that  is,  our  animal 
nature,  usurped  the  place  of  reason  on  the  judgment 
seat,  deciding  in  matters  of  right  and  wrong,  not  by 
what  a  man  had  done,  but  by  the  force  with  which 
he  was  opposed,  the  same  system,  in  fact,  as  prevails 
to-day  under  the  principles  of  knightly  honour.  If 
any  one  doubts  that  such  is  really  the  origin  of  our 
modern  duel,  let  him  read  an  excellent  work  by  J.  B. 
Millingen,  The  History  of  Duelling.2  Nay,  you  may 
still  find  amongst  the  supporters  of  the  system, — who, 
by  the  way,  are  not  usually  the  most  educated  or 
thoughtful  of  men, — some  who  look  upon  the  result  of 
a  duel  as  really  constituting  a  divine  judgment  in  the 
matter  in  dispute ;  no  doubt  in  consequence  of  the 
traditional  feeling  on  the  subject. 

But  leaving  aside  the  question  of  origin,  it  must 
now  be  clear  to  us  that  the  main  tendency  of  the 
principle  is  to  use  physical  menace  for  the  purpose 
of  extorting  an  appearance  of  respect  which  is  deemed 
too  difficult  or  superfluous  to  acquire  in  reality ;  a 
proceeding  which  comes  to  much  the  same  thing  as  if 

1  Part  II.,  Act  2,  Sc.  3. 
*  Published  in  1849. 


100  THE  WISDOM  OF   LIFE. 

you  were  to  prove  the  warmth  of  your  room  by  holding 
your  hand  on  the  thermometer  and  so  make  it  rise. 
In  fact,  the  kernel  of  the  matter  is  this:  whereas 
civic  honour  aims  at  peaceable  intercourse,  and  con- 
sists in  the  opinion  of  other  people  that  we  deserve 
full  confidence,  because  we  pay  unconditional  respect 
to  their  rights,  knightly  honour,  on  the  other  hand, 
lays  down  that  we  are  to  be  feared,  as  being  deter- 
mined at  all  costs  to  maintain  our  own. 

As  not  much  reliance  can  be  placed  upon  human 
integrity,  the  principle  that  it  is  more  essential  to 
arouse  fear  than  to  invite  confidence  would  not, 
perhaps,  be  a  false  one,  if  we  were  living  in  a  state  of 
nature,  where  every  man  would  have  to  protect  him* 
self  and  directly  maintain  his  own  rights.  But  in 
civilised  life,  where  the  State  undertakes  the  protec- 
tion of  our  person  and  property,  the  principle  is  no 
longer  applicable :  it  stands,  like  the  castles  and 
watch-towers  of  the  age  when  might  was  right,  a 
useless  and  forlorn  object,  amidst  well- tilled  fields  and 
frequented  roads,  or  even  railways. 

Accordingly,  the  application  of  knightly  honour, 
which  still  recognises  this  principle,  is  confined  to 
those  small  cases  of  personal  assault  which  meet  with 
but  slight  punishment  at  the  hands  of  the  law,  or 
even  none  at  all,  for  de  minimis  non, — mere  trivial 
wrongs,  committed  sometimes  only  in  jest.  The  con- 
sequence of  this  limited  application  of  the  principle  is 
that  it  has  forced  itself  into  an  exaggerated  respect 
for  the  value  of  the  person, — a  respect  utterly  alien  to 
the  nature,  constitution  or  destiny  of  man — which  it 
has  elevated  into  a  species  of  sanctity  :  and  as  it  con- 


HONOUR.  101 

siders  that  the  State  has  imposed  a  very  insufficient 
penalty  on  the  commission  of  such  trivial  injuries,  it 
takes  upon  itself  to  punish  them  by  attacking  the 
aggressor  in  life  or  limb.  The  whole  thing  manifestly 
rests  upon  an  excessive  degree  of  arrogant  pride, 
which,  completely  forgetting  what  man  really  is, 
claims  that  he  shall  be  absolutely  free  from  all  attack 
or  even  censure.  Those  who  determine  to  carry  out 
this  principle  by  main  force,  and  announce,  as  their 
rule  of  action,  whoever  insults  or  strikes  me  shall  die  ! 
ought  for  their  pains  to  be  banished  the  country.1 

As  a  palliative  to  this  rash  arrogance,  people  are 
in  the  habit  of  giving  way  on  everything.  If  two 
intrepid  persons  meet,  and  neither  will  give  way,  the 

1  Knightly  honour  is  the  child  of  pride  and  folly,  and  it  is  need, 
not  pride,  which  is  the  heritage  of  the  human  race.  It  is  a  very 
remarkable  fact  that  this  extreme  form  of  pride  should  be  found 
exclusively  amongst  the  adherents  of  the  religion  which  teaches 
the  deepest  humility.  Still,  this  pride  must  not  be  put  down  to 
religion,  but,  rather,  to  the  feudal  system,  which  made  every 
nobleman  a  petty  sovereign  who  recognised  no  human  judge, 
and  learned  to  regard  his  person  as  sacred  and  inviolable,  and 
any  attack  upon  it,  or  any  blow  or  insulting  word,  as  an  offence 
punishable  by  death.  The  principle  of  knightly  honour  and  of 
the  duel  was  at  first  confined  to  the  nobles,  and,  later  on,  also  to 
officers  in  the  army,  who,  enjoying  a  kind  of  off-and-on  relation- 
ship with  the  upper  classes,  though  they  were  never  incorporated 
with  them,  were  anxious  not  to  be  behind  them.  It  is  true  that 
duels  were  the  product  of  the  old  ordeals ;  but  the  latter  are  not 
the  foundation,  but  rather  the  consequence  and  application  of 
the  principle  of  honour  :  the  man  who  recognised  no  human 
judge  appealed  to  the  divine.  Ordeals,  however,  are  not  pecu- 
liar to  Christendom  :  they  may  be  found  in  great  force  among 
the  Hindoos,  especially  of  ancient  times ;  and  there  are  traces  of 
them  even  now. 


102  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

slightest  difference  may  cause  a  shower  of  abuse,  then 
fisticuffs,  and,  finally,  a  fatal  blow ;  so  that  it  would 
really  be  a  more  decorous  proceeding  to  omit  the 
intermediate  steps  and  appeal  to  arms  at  once.  An 
appeal  to  arms  has  its  own  special  formalities ;  and 
these  have  developed  into  a  rigid  and  precise  system 
of  laws  and  regulations,  together  forming  the  most 
solemn  farce  there  is, — a  regular  temple  of  honour 
dedicated  to  folly !  For  if  two  intrepid  persons  dis- 
pute over  some  trivial  matter,  (more  important  affairs 
are  dealt  with  by  law),  one  of  them,  the  cleverer  of  the 
two,  will  of  course  yield;  and  they  will  agree  to  differ. 
That  this  is  so  is  proved  by  the  fact  that  common 
people, — or,  rather,  the  numerous  classes  of  the  com- 
munity who  do  not  acknowledge  the  principle  of 
knightly  honour,  let  any  dispute  run  its  natural 
course.  Amongst  these  classes  homicide  is  a  hundred- 
fold rarer  than  among  those — and  they  amount,  per- 
haps, in  all,  to  hardly  one  in  a  thousand, — who  pay 
homage  to  the  principle:  and  even  blows  are  of  no 
very  frequent  occurrence. 

Then  it  has  been  said  that  the  manners  and  tone  of 
good  society  are  ultimately  based  upon  this  principle 
of  honour,  which,  with  its  system  of  duels,  is  made  out 
to  be  a  bulwark  against  the  assaults  of  savagery  and 
rudeness.  But  Athens,  Corinth  and  Rome  could 
assuredly  boast  of  good,  nay,  excellent  society,  and 
manners  and  tone  of  a  high  order,  without  any  sup- 
port from  the  bogey  of  knightly  honour.  It  is  true 
that  women  did  not  occupy  that  prominent  place  in 
ancient  society  which  they  hold  now,  when  conversa- 
tion has  taken  on  a  frivolous  and  trifling  character,  to 


HONOUR.  103 

the  exclusion  of  that  weighty  discourse  which  dis- 
tinguished the  ancients.  This  change  has  certainly 
contributed  a  great  deal  to  bring  about  the  tendency, 
which  is  observable  in  good  society  now-a-days,  to 
prefer  personal  courage  to  the  possession  of  any  other 
quality.  The  fact  is  that  personal  courage  is  really  a 
very  subordinate  virtue, — merely  the  distinguishing 
mark  of  a  subaltern, — a  virtue,  indeed,  in  which  we 
are  surpassed  by  the  lower  animals;  or  else  you  would 
^  not  hear  people  say,  as  brave  as  a  lion.  Far  from 
being  the  pillar  of  society,  knightly  honour  affords  a 
sure  asylum,  in  general  for  dishonesty  and  wickedness, 
and  also  for  small  incivilities,  want  of  consideration 
and  unmannerliness.  Rude  behaviour  is  often  passed 
over  in  silence  because  no  one  cares  to  risk  his  neck  in 
correcting  it. 

After  what  I  have  said,  it  will  not  appear  strange 
that  the  duelling  system  is  carried  to  the  highest  pitch 
of  sanguinary  zeal  precisely  in  that  nation  whose 
political  and  financial  records  show  that  they  are  not 
too  honourable.  What  that  nation  is  like  in  its 
private  and  domestic  life,  is  a  question  which  may  be 
best  put  to  those  who  are  experienced  in  the  matter. 
Their  urbanity  and  social  culture  have  long  been  con- 
spicuous by  their  absence. 

There  is  no  truth,  then,  in  such  pretexts.  It  can 
be  urged  with  more  justice  that  as,  when  you  snarl  at 
a  dog,  he  snarls  in  return,  and  when  you  pet  him,  he 
fawns ;  so  it  lies  in  the  nature  of  men  to  return 
hostility  by  hostility,  and  to  be  embittered  and  irri- 
tated at  any  signs  of  depreciatory  treatment  or  hatred: 
and,  as  Cicero  says,  there  is  something  so  penetrating 


104  THE   WISDOM   OF   LIFE. 

in  the  shaft  of  envy  that  even  men  of  wisdom  and  worth 
find  its  wound  a  painful  one;  and  nowhere  in  the 
world,  except,  perhaps,  in  a  few  religious  sects,  is  an 
insult  or  a  blow  taken  with  equanimity.  And  yet  a 
natural  view  of  either  would  in  no  case  demand  any- 
thing more  than  a  requital  proportionate  to  the  offence, 
and  would  never  go  the  length  of  assigning  death  as 
the  proper  penalty  for  anyone  who  accuses  another  of 
lying  or  stupidity  or  cowardice.  The  old  German 
theory  of  blood  for  a  blow  is  a  revolting  superstition 
of  the  age  of  chivahy.  And  in  any  case  the  return 
or  requital  of  an  insult  is  dictated  by  anger,  and  not 
by  any  such  obligation  of  honour  and  duty  as  the  ad- 
vocates of  chivalry  seek  to  attach  to  it.  The  fact  is 
that,  the  greater  the  truth,  the  greater  the  slander ; 
and  it  is  clear  that  the  slightest  hint  of  some  real 
delinquency  will  give  much  greater  offence  than  a 
most  terrible  accusation  which  is  perfectly  baseless : 
so  that  a  man  who  is  quite  sure  that  he  has  done 
nothing  to  deserve  a  reproach  may  treat  it  with  con- 
tempt, and  will  be  safe  in  doing  so.  The  theory  of 
honour  demands  that  he  shall  show  a  susceptibility 
which  he  does  not  possess,  and  take  bloody  vengeance 
for  insults  which  he  cannot  feel.  A  man  must  him- 
self have  but  a  poor  opinion  of  his  own  worth  who 
hastens  to  prevent  the  utterance  of  an  unfavourable 
opinion  by  giving  his  enemy  a  black  eye. 

True  appreciation  of  his  own  value  will  make  a  man 
really  indifferent  to  insult ;  but  if  he  cannot  help  resent- 
ing it,  a  little  shrewdness  and  culture  will  enable  him 
to  save  appearances  and  dissemble  his  anger.  If  we 
could  only  get  rid  of  this  superstition  about  honour — 


HONOUR.  10° 


the  idea,  I  mean,  that  it  disappears  when  you  ai.  in- 
sulted, and  can  be  restored  by  returning  the ,  msoH 
if  we  could  only  stop  people  from  flunking  that  wrong, 
brntality  and  insolence  can  be  legalised  by  expressing 
readiness  to  give  satisfaction,  that  is,  to  fight  m  de- 
fence of  it,  we  should  all  soon  come   o  the  ge-ral 
opinion  that  insult  and  depreciation  are  like  a  battle  in 
which  the  loser  wins ;  and  that,  as  Vincenzo  Monti  says, 
abuse  resembles  a  church-procession,  because  it  always 
returns  to  the  point  from  which  it  se    out     H  we 
could  only  get  people  to  look  upon  insnl t  in  this  light 
we  should  no  longer  have  to  say  something  rude  in 
order  to  prove  that  we  are  in  the  right.     Now   un- 
fortunately, if  we  want  to  take  a  serious  view  of  any 
question,  we  have  first  of  all  to  consider ^whether  _* 
will  not  give  offence  in  some  way  or  other  to  the 
dullard,  who  generally  shows  alarm  and  resentmen   at 
the  merest   sign  of  intelligence:  and  i    may  eas.ly 
happen  that  the  head  which  contains  the  mtelugen 
view  has  to  be  pitted  against  the  noddle  which  is 
empty  of  everything  but  narrowness  and  stupidity. 
If  all  this  were  done  away  with,  intellectual  superio- 
rity could  take  the  leading  place  in  society  which  is 
its  due-a  Place  now  occupied,  though  people  do  not 
like  to  confess  it,  by  excellence  of  physique    mere 
fitting  pluck,  in  fact;  and  the  natural  effect  of  such 
a°change  would  be  that  the  best  kind  of  people  would 
have  one  reason  the  less  for  withdrawing  from  society 
This  would  pave  the  way  for  the  introduction  of  real 
courtesy  and  genuinely   good   society    such   as   un- 
doubtedly   existed    in  Athens,    Corinth  and   Borne. 
If  anyone   wants   to   see   a   good   example  of   what 


ll)<3  THE   WISDOM!   OF   LIFE. 

I  mean,  I  should  like  him  to  read  Xenophon's 
Banquet 

The  last  argument  in  defence  of  knightly  honour 
no  doubt  is,  that,  but  for  its  existence,  the  world — 
awful  thought ! — would  be  a  regular  bear-garden.  To 
which  I  may  briefly  reply  that  nine  hundred  and 
ninety-nine  people  out  of  a  thousand  who  do  not  re- 
cognise the  code,  have  often  given  and  received  a  blow 
without  any  fatal  consequences ;  whereas  amongst  the 
adherents  of  the  code  a  blow  usually  means  death  to 
one  of  the  parties.  But  let  me  examine  this  argument 
more  closely. 

I  have  often  tried  to  find  some  tenable  or,  at  any 
rate,  plausible  basis — other  than  a  merely  conventional 
one — some  positive  reasons,  that  is  to  say,  for  the 
rooted  conviction  which  a  portion  of  mankind  enter- 
tains, that  a  blow  is  a  very  dreadful  thing  ;  but  I  have 
looked  for  it  in  vain,  either  in  the  animal  or  in  the 
rational  side  of  human  nature.  A  blow  is,  and  always 
will  be,  a  trivial  physical  injury  which  one  man  can 
do  to  another ;  proving,  thereby,  nothing  more  than 
his  superiority  in  strength  or  skill,  or  that  his  enemy 
was  off  his  guard.  Analysis  will  carry  us  no  further. 
The  same  knight  who  regards  a  blow  from  the  human 
hand  as  the  greatest  of  evils,  if  he  gets  a  ten  times 
harder  blow  from  his  horse,  will  give  you  the  assurance, 
as  he  limps  away  in  suppressed  pain,  that  it  is  a 
matter  of  no  consequence  whatever.  So  I  have  come 
to  think  that  it  is  the  human  hand  which  is  at  the 
bottom  of  the  mischief.  And  yet  in  a  battle  the 
knight  may  get  cuts  and  thrusts  from  the  same  hand, 
and  still  assure  you   that  his  wounds  are  not  worth 


HONOUR.  107 

mentioning.  Now,  I  hear  that  a  blow  from  the  fiat  of 
a  sword  is  not  by  any  means  so  bad  as  a  blow  with  a 
stick ;  and  that,  a  short  time  ago,  cadets  were  liable  to 
be  punished  by  the  one  but  not  the  other,  and  that 
the  very  greatest  honour  of  all  is  the  accolade.  This 
is  all  the  psychological  or  moral  basis  that  I  can  find ; 
and  so  there  is  nothing  left  me  but  to  pronounce  the 
whole  thing  an  antiquated  superstition  that  has  taken 
deep  root,  and  one  more  of  the  many  examples  which 
show  the  force  of  tradition.  My  view  is  confirmed 
by  the  well-known  fact  that  in  China  a  beating  with 
a  bamboo  is  a  very  frequent  punishment  for  the  com- 
mon people,  and  even  for  officials  of  every  class ; 
which  shows  that  human  nature,  even  in  a  highly 
civilized  state,  does  not  run  in  the  same  groove  here 
and  in  China. 

On  the  contrary,  an  unprejudiced  view  of  human 
nature  shows  that  it  is  just  as  natural  for  man  to  beat 
as  it  is  for  savage  animals  to  bite  and  rend  in  pieces, 
or  for  horned  beasts  to  butt  or  push.  Man  may  be 
said  to  be  the  animal  that  beats.  Hence  it  is  re- 
volting to  our  sense  of  the  fitness  of  things  to  hear,  as 
we  sometimes  do,  that  one  man  has  bitten  another ; 
on  the  other  hand,  it  is  a  natural  and  everyday 
occurrence  for  him  to  get  blows  or  give  them.  It  is 
intelligible  enough  that,  as  we  become  educated,  we 
are  glad  to  dispense  with  blows  by  a  system  of  mutual 
restraint.  But  it  is  a  cruel  thing  to  compel  a  nation 
or  a  single  class  to  regard  a  blow  as  an  awful  mis- 
fortune which  must  have  death  and  murder  for  its 
consequences.  There  are  too  many  genuine  evils  in 
the    world    to  allow    of    our    increasing    them    by 


108  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

imaginary  misfortunes,  which  bring  real  ones  in  their 
train ;  and  yet  this  is  the  precise  effect  of  the  super- 
stition, which  thus  proves  itself  at  once  stupid  and 
malign. 

It  does  not  seem  to  me  wise  of  governments  and 
legislative  bodies  to  promote  any  such  folly  by 
attempting  to  do  away  with  flogging  as  a  punishment 
in  civil  or  military  life.  Their  idea  is  that  they  are 
acting  in  the  interests  of  humanity  ;  but,  in  point  of 
fact,  they  are  doing  just  the  opposite;  for  the  abolition 
of  flogging  will  serve  only  to  strengthen  this  inhuman 
and  abominable  superstition,  to  which  so  many  sacri- 
fices have  already  been  made.  For  all  offences,  except 
the  worst,  a  beating  is  the  obvious  and  therefore  the 
natural  penalty ;  and  a  man  who  will  not  listen  to 
reason  will  yield  to  blows.  It  seems  to  me  right  and 
proper  to  administer  corporal  punishment  to  the  man 
who  possesses  nothing  and  therefore  cannot  be  fined, 
or  cannot  be  put  in  prison  because  his  master's  interests 
would  suffer  by  the  loss  of  his  services.  There  are 
really  no  arguments  against  it ;  only  mere  talk  about 
the  dignity  of  man — talk  which  proceeds,  not  from 
any  clear  notions  on  the  subject,  but  from  the  per- 
nicious superstition  I  have  been  describing.  That  it 
is  a  superstition  which  lies  at  the  bottom  of  the  whole 
business  is  proved  by  an  almost  laughable  example. 
Not  long  ago,  in  the  military  discipline  of  many 
countries,  the  cat  was  replaced  by  the  stick.  In  either 
case  the  object  was  to  produce  physical  pain  ;  but  the 
latter  method  involved  no  disgrace,  and  was  not 
derogatory  to  honour. 

By  promoting  this  superstition,  the  State  is  playing 


HONOUR.  109 

into  the  hands  of  the  principle  of  knightly  honour, 
and  therefore  of  the  duel ;  while  at  the  same  time  it 
is  trying,  or  at  any  rate  it  pretends  that  it  is  trying, 
to  abolish  the  duel  by  legislative  enactment.  As  a 
natural  consequence  we  find  that  this  fragment  of  the 
theory  that  might  is  right,  which  has  come  down  to 
us  from  the  most  savage  days  of  the  Middle  Age,  has 
still  in  this  nineteenth  century  a  good  deal  of  life  left 
in  it — more  shame  to  us !  It  is  high  time  for  the 
principle  to  be  driven  out  bag  and  baggage.  Now-a- 
days,  no  one  is  allowed  to  set  dogs  or  cocks  to  fight 
each  other, — at  any  rate,  in  England  it  is  a  penal 
offence, — but  men  are  plunged  into  deadly  strife, 
against  their  will,  by  the  operation  of  this  ridiculous, 
superstitious  and  absurd  principle,  which  imposes 
upon  us  the  obligation,  as  its  narrow-minded  sup- 
porters and  advocates  declare,  of  fighting  with  one 
another  like  gladiators,  for  any  little  trifle.  Let  me 
recommend  our  purists  to  adopt  the  expression  halting} 
instead  of  duel,  which  probably  comes  to  us,  not  from 
the  Latin  duellum,  but  from  the  Spanish  duelo, — 
meaning  suffering,  nuisance,  annoyance. 

In  any  case,  we  may  well  laugh  at  the  pedantic 
excess  to  which  this  foolish  system  has  been  carried 
It  is  really  revolting  that  this  principle,  with  its  absurd 
code,  can  form  a  power  within  the  State — imperium 
in  imperio — a  power  too  easily  put  in  motion,  which, 
recognising  no  right  but  might,  tyrannises  over  the 
classes  which  come  within  its  range,  by  keeping  up  a 
sort  of  inquisition,  before  which  any  one  may  be  haled 
on  the  most   flimsy  pretext,  and  there  and  then  be 

1  Ritterhetze. 


110  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

tried  on  an  issue  of  life  and  death  between  himself  and 
his  opponent.  This  is  the  lurking  place  from  which 
every  rascal,  if  he  only  belongs  to  the  classes  in  ques- 
tion, may  menace  and  even  exterminate  the  noblest  and 
best  of  men,  who,  as  such,  must  of  course  be  an  object 
of  hatred  to  him.  Our  system  of  justice  and  police- 
protection  has  made  it  impossible  in  these  days  for 
any  scoundrel  in  the  street  to  attack  us  with — Your 
money  or  your  life  !  and  common  sense  ought  now  to 
be  able  to  prevent  rogues  disturbing  the  peaceable 
intercourse  of  society  by  coming  at  us  with — Your 
honour  or  your  life  !  An  end  should  be  put  to  the 
burden  which  weighs  upon  the  higher  classes — the 
burden,  I  mean,  of  having  to  be  ready  every  moment 
to  expose  life  and  limb  to  the  mercy  of  anyone  who 
takes  it  into  his  rascally  head  to  be  coarse,  rude, 
foolish  or  malicious.  It  is  perfectly  atrocious  that  a 
pair  of  silly,  passionate  boys  should  be  wounded, 
maimed  or  even  killed,  simply  because  they  have  had 
a  few  words. 

The  strength  of  this  tyrannical  power  within  the 
State,  and  the  force  of  the  superstition,  may  be 
measured  by  the  fact  that  people  who  are  prevented 
from  restoring  their  knightly  honour  by  the  superior 
or  inferior  rank  of  their  aggressor,  or  anything  else 
that  puts  the  persons  on  a  different  level,  often  come 
to  a  tragic-comic  end  by  committing  suicide  in  sheer 
despair.  You  may  generally  know  a  thing  to  be 
false  and  ridiculous  by  finding  that,  if  it  is  carried  to 
its  logical  conclusion,  it  results  in  a  contradiction ; 
and  here,  too,  we  have  a  very  glaring  absurdity.  For 
an  officer  is  forbidden  to  take  part  in  a  duel ;  but  if 


HONOUR.  1  i  1 

he  is  challenged  and  declines  to  come  out,  he  is 
punished  by  being  dismissed  the  service. 

As  I  am  on  the  matter*  let  me  be  more  frank  still. 
The  important  distinction,  which  is  often  insisted 
upon,  between  killing  your  enemy  in  a  fair  fight  with 
equal  weapons,  and  lying  in  ambush  for  him,  is 
entirely  a  corollary  pf  the  fact  that  the  power  within 
the  State,  of  which  I  have  spoken,  recognises  no  other 
right  than  might,  that  is,  the  right  of  the  stronger, 
and  appeals  to  a  Judgment  of  God  as  the  basis  of  the 
whole  code.  For  to  kill  a  man  in  a  fair  fio-ht,  is  to 
prove  that  you  are  superior  to  him  in  strength  or 
skill ;  and  to  justify  the  deed,  you  must  assume  that  the 
right  of  the  stronger  is  recdly  a  right 

But  the  truth  is  that,  if  my  opponent  is  unable  to 
defend  himself,  it  gives  me  the  possibility,  but  not  by 
any  means  the  right,  of  killing  him.  The  right,  the 
moral  justification,  must  depend  entirely  upon  the 
motives  which  I  have  for  taking  his  life.  Even  sup- 
posing that  I  have  sufficient  motive  for  taking  a  man's 
life,  there  is  no  reason  why  I  should  make  his  death 
depend  upon  whether  I  can  shoot  or  fence  betterlhan 
he.  In  such  a  case,  it  is  immaterial  in  what  way  I 
kill  him,  whether  I  attack  him  from  the  front  or  the 
rear.  From  a  moral  point  of  view,  the  right  of  the 
stronger  is  no  more  convincing  than  the  right  of  the 
more  skilful ;  and  it  is  skill  which  is  employed  if  you 
murder  a  man  treacherously.  Might  and  skill  are  in 
this  case  equally  right :  in  a  duel,  for  instance,  both 
the  one  and  the  other  come  into  play  ;  for  a  feint  is 
only  another  name  for  treachery.  If  I  consider  my- 
self morally  justified  in  taking  a  ma«'s  life,  it  is  stupid 


112  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

of  me  to  try  first  of  all  whether  he  can  shoot  or  fence 
better  than  I ;  as,  if  he  can,  he  will  not  only  have 
wronged  me,  but  have  taken  my  life  into  the  bargain. 

It  is  Rousseau's  opinion  that  the  proper  way  to 
avenge  an  insult  is,  not  to  fight  a  duel  with  your 
aggressor,  but  to  assassinate  him, — an  opinion,  however, 
which  he  is  cautious  enough  only  just  to  indicate  in 
a  mysterious  note  to  one  of  the  books  of  his  Emile 
This  shows  the  philosopher  so  completely  under  the 
influence  of  the  mediaeval  superstition  of  knightly 
honour  that  he  considers  it  justifiable  to  murder  a 
man  who  accuses  you  of  lying  •  whilst  he  must  have 
known  that  every  man,  and  himself  especially,  has 
deserved  to  have  the  lie  given  him  times  without 
number. 

The  prejudice  which  justifies  the  killing  of  your 
adversary,  so  long  as  it  is  done  in  an  open  contest  and 
with  equal  weapons,  obviously  looks  upon  might  as 
really  right,  and  a  duel  as  the  interference  of  GocL 
The  Italian  who,  in  a  fit  of  rage,  falls  upon  his 
aggressor  wherever  he  finds  hira,  and  despatches  him 
without  any  ceremony,  acts,  at  any  rate,  consistently 
and  naturally :  he  may  be  cleverer,  but  he  is  not 
worse,  than  the  duellist.  If  you  say,  I  am  justified 
in  killing  my  adversary  in  a  duel,  because  he  is  at  the 
moment  doing  his  best  to  kill  me,  I  can  reply  that  it 
is  your  challenge  which  has  placed  him  under  the 
necessity  of  defending  himself  ;  and  that  by  mutually 
putting  it  on  the  ground  of  self-defence,  the  combat- 
ants are  seeking  a  plausible  pretext  for  committing 
murder.  I  should  rather  justify  the  deed  by  the  legal 
maxim  Volenti  non  ,JU  iryuria ;   because  the  parties 


HONOUR.  113 

mutually  agree  to  set  their  life  upon  the  issue.  This 
argument  may,  however,  be  rebutted  by  showing  that 
the  injured  party  is  not  injured  volens  ;  because  it  is 
this  tyrannical  principle  of  knightly  honour,  with  its 
absurd  code,  which  forcibly  drags  one  at  least  of  the 
combatants  before  a  bloody  inquisition. 

I  have  been  rather  prolix  on  the  subject  of  knightly 
honour,  but  I  had  good  reasons  for  being  so,  because 
the  Augean  stable  of  moral  and  intellectual  enormity 
in  this  world  can  be  cleaned  out  only  with  the 
besom  of  philosophy.  There  are  two  things  which 
more  than  all  else  serve  to  make  the  social  arrange- 
ments of  modern  life  compare  unfavourably  with 
those  of  antiquity,  by  giving  our  age  a  gloomy,  dark 
and  sinister  aspect,  from  which  antiquity,  fresh, 
natural  and,  as  it  were,  in  the  morning  of  life,  is  com- 
pletely free ;  I  mean  modern  honour  and  modern 
disease, — par  nobile  fratrum  ! — which  have  combined 
to  poison  all  the  relations  of  life,  whether  public  or 
private.  The  second  of  this  noble  pair  extends  its 
influence  much  farther  than  at  first  appears  to  be  the 
case,  as  being  not  merely  a  physical,  but  also  a  moral 
disease.  From  the  time  that  poisoned  arrows  have 
been  found  in  Cupid's  quiver,  an  estranging,  hostile, 
nay,  devilish  element  has  entered  into  the  relations  of 
men  and  women,  like  a  sinister  thread  of  fear  and 
mistrust  in  the  warp  and  woof  of  their  intercourse  ; 
indirectly  shaking  the  foundations  of  human  fellow- 
ship, and  so  more  or  less  affecting  the  whole  tenor  of 
existence.  But  it  would  be  beside  my  present  purpose 
to  pursue  the  subject  further. 


114  THE   WISDOM   OF   LIFE. 

An  influence  analogous  to  this,  though  working  on 
other  lines,  is  exerted  by  the  principle  of  knightly 
honour, — that  solemn  farce,  unknown  to  the  ancient 
world,  which  makes  modern  society  stiff,  gloomy  and 
timid,  forcing  us  to  keep  the  strictest  watch  on  every 
word  that  falls.  Nor  is  this  all.  The  principle  is  a 
universal  Minotaur ;  and  the  goodly  company  of  the 
sons  of  noble  houses  which  it  demands  in  yearly 
tribute,  comes,  not  from  one  country  alone,  as  of  old, 
but  from  every  land  in  Europe.  It  is  high  time  to 
make  a  regular  attack  upon  this  foolish  system ;  and 
this  is  what  I  am  trying  to  do  now.  Would  that 
these  two  monsters  of  the  modern  world  might  dis- 
appear before  the  end  of  the  century  ! 

Let  us  hope  that  medicine  may  be  able  to  find  some 
means  of  preventing  the  one,  and  that,  by  clearing 
our  ideas,  philosophy  may  put  an  end  to  the  other  ; 
for  it  is  only  by  clearing  our  ideas  that  the  evil  can 
be  eradicated.  Governments  have  tried  to  do  so  by 
legislation,  and  failed. 

Still,  if  they  are  really  concerned  to  suppress  the 
duelling  system ;  and  if  the  small  success  that  has 
attended  their  efforts  is  really  due  only  to  their  in- 
ability to  cope  with  the  evil,  I  do  not  mind  proposing 
a  law  the  success  of  which  I  am  prepared  to  guarantee. 
It  will  involve  no  sanguinary  measures,  and  can  be 
put  into  operation  without  recourse  either  to  the 
scaffold  or  the  gallows,  or  to  imprisonment  for  life. 
It  is  a  small  homoeopathic  pilule,  with  no  serious 
after-effects.  If  any  man  send  or  accept  a  challenge, 
let  the  corporal  take  him  before  the  guard  house,  and 
there  give  him,  in  broad  daylight,  twelve  strokes  with 


HONOUR.  115 

a  stick  a  la  Chinoise ;  a  non-commissioned  officer  or  a 
private  to  receive  six.  If  a  duel  has  actually  taken 
place,  the  usual  criminal  proceedings  should  be 
instituted. 

A  person  with  knightly  notions  might,  perhaps,  object 
that,  if  such  a  punishment  were  carried  out,  a  man  of 
honour  would  possibly  shoot  himself ;  to  which  I 
should  answer  that  it  is  better  for  a  fool  like  that  to 
shoot  himself  rather  than  other  people.  However,  1 
know  very  well  that  governments  are  not  really  in 
earnest  about  putting  down  duelling.  Civil  officials, 
and  much  more  so,  officers  in  the  army,  (except  those 
in  the  highest  positions),  are  paid  most  inadequately 
for  the  services  they  perform ;  and  the  deficiency  is 
made  up  by  honour,  which  is  represented  by  titles 
and  orders,  and,  in  general,  by  the  system  of  rank 
and  distinction.  The  duel  is,  so  to  speak,  a  very 
serviceable  extra-horse  for  people  of  rank:  so  they 
are  trained  in  the  knowledge  of  it  at  the  universities. 
The  accidents  which  happen  to  those  who  use  it  make 
up  in  blood  for  the  deficiency  of  the  pay. 


Just  to  complete  the  discussion,  let  me  here  men- 
tion the  subject  of  national  honour.  It  is  the  honour 
of  a  nation  as  a  unit  in  the  aggregate  of  nations. 
And  as  there  is  no  court  to  appeal  to  but  the  court  of 
force ;  and  as  every  nation  must  be  prepared  to 
defend  its  own  interests,  the  honour  of  a  nation 
consists  in  establishing  the  opinion,  not  only  that  it 
may  be  trusted  (its  credit),  but  also  that  it  is  to  be 
feared.      An  attack  upon  its  rights  must  never  be 


116  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

allowed  to  pass  unheeded.      It  is  a  combination  of 
civic  and  of  knightly  honour. 

Section  S. — Fame. 

Under  the  heading  of  place  in  the  estimation  of  the 
world  we  have  put  Fame;  and  this  we  must  now 
proceed  to  consider. 

Fame  and  honour  are  twins ;  and  twins,  too,  like 
Castor  and  Pollux,  of  whom  the  one  was  mortal  and 
the  other  was  not.  Fame  is  the  undying  brother  of 
ephemeral  honour.  I  speak,  of  course,  of  the  highest 
kind  of  fame,  that  is,  of  fame  in  the  true  and  genuine 
sense  of  the  word;  for,  to  be  sure,  there  are  many 
sorts  of  fame,  some  of  which  last  but  a  day.  Honour 
is  concerned  merely  with  such  qualities  as  eve^one 
may  be  expected  to  show  under  similar  circumstances ; 
fame  only  with  those  which  cannot  be  required 
of  any  man.  Honour  is  of  qualities  which  everyone 
has  a  right  to  attribute  to  himself;  fame  only  of 
those  which  should  be  left  to  others  to  attribute. 
Whilst  our  honour  extends  as  far  as  people  have 
knowledge  of  us ;  fame  runs  in  advance,  and  makes 
us  known  wherever  it  finds  its  way.  Every  one 
can  make  a  claim  to  honour;  very  few  to  fame,  as 
being  attainable  only  in  virtue  of  extraordinary 
achievements. 

These  achievements  may  be  of  two  kinds,  either 
actions  or  works;  and  so  to  fame  there  are  two  paths 
open.  On  the  path  of  actions,  a  great  heart  is  the 
chief  recommendation ;  on  that  of  works,  a  great  head. 
Each  of  the  two  paths  has  its  own  peculiar  advantages 


FAME.  117 

and  detriments;  and  the  chief  difference  between 
them  is  that  actions  are  fleeting,  while  works  remain. 
The  influence  of  an  action,  be  it  never  so  noble,  can 
last  but  a  short  time ;  but  a  work  of  genius  is  a  living 
influence,  beneficial  and  ennobling  throughout  the 
ages.  All  that  can  remain  of  actions  is  a  memory, 
and  that  becomes  weak  and  disfigured  by  time — a 
matter  of  indifference  to  us,  until  at  last  it  is  extin- 
guished altogether ;  unless,  indeed,  history  takes  it  up, 
and  presents  it,  fossilized,  to  posterity.  Works  are 
immortal  in  themselves,  and  once  committed  to  writ- 
ing, may  live  for  ever.  Of  Alexander  the  Great  we 
have  but  the  name  and  the  record :  but  Plato  and 
Aristotle,  Homer  and  Horace  are  alive,  and  as  directly 
at  work  to-day  as  they  were  in  their  own  life-time. 
The  Vedas,  and  their  Upanishads,  are  still  with  us ; 
but  of  all  contemporaneous  actions  not  a  trace  has 
come  down  to  us.1 

1  Accordingly  it  is  a  poor  compliment,  though  sometimes  a 
fashionable  one,  to  try  to  pay  honour  to  a  work  by  calling  it  an 
action.  For  a  work  is  something  essentially  higher  in  its  nature. 
An  action  is  always  something  based  on  motive,  and,  therefore, 
fragmentary  and  fleeting — a  part,  in  fact,  of  that  Will  which  is 
the  universal  and  original  element  in  the  constitution  of  the 
world.  But  a  great  and  beautiful  work  has  a  permanent  char- 
acter, as  being  of  universal  significance,  and  sprung  from  the 
Intellect,  which  rises,  like  a  perfume,  above  the  faults  and  follies 
of  the  world  of  Will. 

The  fame  of  a  great  action  has  this  advantage,  that  it  gene- 
rally starts  with  a  loud  explosion,  so  loud,  indeed,  as  to  be 
heard  all  over  Europe,  whereas  the  fame  of  a  great  work  is  slow 
and  gradual  in  its  beginnings ;  the  noise  it  makes  is  at  first  slight, 
but  it  goes  on  growing  greater,  until  at  last,  after  a  hundred 
years  perhaps,  it  attains  its  full  force ;  but  then  it  remains, 


118  THE   WISDOM   OF  LIFE. 

Another  disadvantage  under  which  actions  labour  is 
that  they  depend  upon  chance  for  the  possibility  of 
coming  into  existence ;  and  hence,  the  fame  they  win 
does  not  flow  entirely  from  their  intrinsic  value,  but 
also  from  the  circumstances  which  happened  to  lend 
them  importance  and  lustre.  Again,  the  fame  of 
actions,  if,  as  in  war,  they  are  purely  personal,  depends 
upon  the  testimony  of  fewer  witnesses ;  and  these  are 
not  always  present,  and  even  if  present,  are  not  always 
just  or  unbiassed  observers.  This  disadvantage,  how- 
ever, is  counterbalanced  by  the  fact  that  actions  have 
the  advantage  of  being  of  a  practical  character,  and, 
therefore,  within  the  range  of  general  human  intelli- 
gence; so  that  when  the  facts  have  been  correctly  re- 
ported, justice  is  immediately  done  ;  unless,  indeed,  the 
motive  underlying  the  action  is  not  at  first  properly 
understood  or  appreciated.  No  action  can  be  really 
understood  apart  from  the  motive  which  prompted  it. 

It  is  just  the  contrary  with  works.  Their  inception 
does  not  depend  upon  chance,  but  wholly  and  entirely 
upon  their  author;  and  whatever  they  are  in  and  for 
themselves,  that  they  remain  as  long  as  they  live. 
Further,  there  is  a  difficulty  in  properly  judging  them, 
which  becomes  all  the  harder, the  higher  their  character; 
often  there  are  no  persons  competent  to  understand 
the  work,  and  often  no  unbiassed  or  honest  critics. 
Their  fame,  however,  does  not  depend  upon  one  judge 

because  the  works  remain,  for  thousands  of  years.  But  in  the 
other  case,  when  the  first  explosion  is  over,  the  noise  it  makes 
grows  less  and  less,  and  is  heard  by  fewer  and  fewer  persons  ; 
until  it  ends  by  the  action  having  only  a  shadowy  existence  in 
the  pages  of  history. 


FAME.  119 

only;  they  can  enter  an  appeal  to  another.  In  the 
case  of  actions,  as  I  have  said,  it  is  only  their  memory 
which  comes  down  to  posterity,  and  then  only  in  the 
traditional  form ;  but  works  are  handed  down  them- 
selves, and,  except  when  parts  of  them  have  been  lost, 
in  the  form  in  which  they  first  appeared.  In  this 
ca<e  there  is  no  room  for  any  disfigurement  of  the 
i'acos;  and  any  circumstances  which  may  have  preju- 
diced them  in  their  origin,  fall  away  with  the  lapse  of 
time.  Nay,  it  is  often  only  after  the  lapse  of  time 
that  the  persons  really  competent  to  judge  them  ap- 
pear— exceptional  critics  sitting  in  judgment  on  ex- 
ceptional works,  and  giving  their  weighty  verdicts  in 
succession.  These  collectively  form  a  perfectly  just 
appreciation ;  and  though  there  are  cases  where  it  has 
taken  some  hundreds  of  years  to  form  it,  no  further 
lapse  of  time  is  able  to  reverse  the  verdict ; — so  secure 
and  inevitable  is  the  fame  of  a  great  work. 

Whether  authors  ever  live  to  see  the  dawn  of  their 
fame  depends  upon  the  chance  of  circumstance ;  and 
the  higher  and  more  important  their  works  are,  the 
less  likelihood  there  is  of  their  doing  so.  That  was  an 
incomparably  fine  saying  of  Seneca's,  that  fame  follows 
merit  as  surely  as  the  body  casts  a  shadow ;  sometimes 
falling  in  front,  and  sometimes  behind.  And  he  goes 
on  to  remark  that  though  the  envy  of  contemporaries 
be  shoivn  by  universal  silence,  there  will  come  those  who 
will  judge  without  enmity  or  favour.  From  this  re- 
mark it  is  manifest  that  even  in  Seneca's  age  there 
were  rascals  who  understood  the  art  of  suppressing 
,  merit  by  maliciously  ignoring  its  existence,  and  of 
concealing  good  work  from  the   public  in  order  to 


120  THE   WISDOM   OF   LIFE. 

favour  the  bad.  It  is  an  art  well  understood  in  our 
day,  too,  manifesting  itself,  both  then  and  now,  in  an 
envious  conspiracy  of  silence. 

As  a  general  rule,  the  longer  a  man's  fame  is  likely 
to  last,  the  later  it  will  be  in  coming  ;  for  all  excellent 
products  require  time  for  their  development.  The 
fame  which  lasts  to  posterity  is  like  an  oak,  of  very 
slow  growth  ;  and  that  which  endures  but  a  little 
while,  like  plants  which  spring  up  in  a  year  and  then 
die ;  whilst  false  fame  is  like  a  fungus,  shooting  up  in 
a  night  and  perishing  as  soon. 

And  why  ?  For  this  reason :  the  more  a  man 
belongs  to  posterity,  in  other  words,  to  humanity  in 
general,  the  more  of  an  alien  he  is  to  his  contem- 
poraries; since  his  work  is  not  meant  for  them  as 
such,  but  only  for  them  in  so  far  as  they  form  part  of 
mankind  at  large  ;  there  is  none  of  that  familiar  local 
colour  about  his  productions  which  would  appeal  to 
them;  and  so  what  he  does,  fails  of  recognition  because 
it  is  strange.  People  are  more  likely  to  appreciate 
the  man  who  serves  the  circumstances  of  his  own  brief 
hour,  or  the  temper  of  the  moment, — belonging  to  it, 
and  living  and  dying  with  it. 

The  general  history  of  art  and  literature  shows  that 
the  highest  achievements  of  the  human  mind  are,  as  a 
rule,  not  favourably  received  at  first ;  but  remain  in 
obscurity  until  they  win  notice  from  intelligence  of  a 
higher  order,  by  whose  influence  they  are  brought 
into  a  position  which  they  then  maintain,  in  virtue  of 
the  authority  thus  given  them. 

If  the  reason  of  this  should  be  asked,  it  will  be 
found  that  ultimately,  a  man  can  really  understand 


FAME.  121 

and  appreciate  those  things  only  which  are  of  like 
nature  with  himself.  The  dull  person  will  like  what 
is  dull,  and  the  common  person  what  is  common ;  a 
man  whose  ideas  are  mixed  will  be  attracted  by  con  - 
fusion  of  thought ;  and  folly  will  appeal  to  him  who 
has  no  brains  at  all;  but  best  of  all,  a  man  will  like 
his  own  works,  as  being  of  a  character  thoroughly  at 
one  with  himself.  This  is  a  truth  as  old  as  Epichar- 
mus  of  fabulous  memory — 

OavfMKJTov  ovSev  kcni  /xe  ravO'  ovto>  Aeyeiv 
Kcu  avBdvetv  avTolcrtv  avTOvs,  kcll  SokgTv 

KciAoJS  7T€(fiVK€VaL'   KOU  yap  6   KViOV  KVVl 

KciAAmttoi/  eTfxev  <f>div€Tai,  kcu  fSovs  fiot 

"OvOS  C*'   OV(£>   KaXXtCTTOV   [tCTTtv],  V<$  8'   vt. 

The  sense  of  this  passage — for  it  should  not  be  lost — 
is  that  we  should  not  be  surprised  if  people  are  pleased 
with  themselves,  and  fancy  that  they  are  in  good  case; 
for  to  a  dog  the  best  thing  in  the  world  is  a  dog ;  to 
an  ox,  an  ox  ;  to  an  ass,  an  ass  ;  and  to  a  sow,  a  sow. 

The  strongest  arm  is  unavailing  to  give  impetus  to 
a  feather-weight ;  for,  instead  of  speeding  on  its  way 
and  hitting  its  mark  with  effect,  it  will  soon  fall  to  the 
ground,  having  expended  what  little  energy  was  given 
to  it,  and  possessing  no  mass  of  its  own  to  be  the 
vehicle  of  momentum.  So  it  is  with  great  and  noble 
thoughts,  nay,  with  the  very  masterpieces  of  genius, 
when  there  are  none  but  little,  weak,  and  perverse 
minds  to  appreciate  them, — a  fact  which  has  been 
deplored  by  a  chorus  of  the  wise  in  all  ages.  Jesus, 
the  son  of  Sirach,  for  instance,  declares  that  He  that 


122  TflE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

telleth  a  tale  to  a  fool  speaketh  to  one  in  slumber: 
when  he  hath  told  his  tale,  he  will  say,  What  is  the 
matter  ? l  And  Hamlet  says,  A  knavish  speech  sleeps 
in  a  fool's  ear.2  And  Goethe  is  of  the  same  opinion, 
that  a  dull  ear  mocks  at  the  wisest  word, 

i  Das  gliichlichste  fVort  es  wird  vcrhb'hnt, 

Wenn  der  Rarer  ein  Schiefotvr  ist: 

and  again,  that  we  should  not  be  discouraged  if  people 
are  stupid,  for  you  can  make  no  rings  if  you  throw 
your  stone  into  a  marsh : — 

Du  wirhest  nicht,  Alles  bleibt  so  dmnpf: 

Sei  guter  Dinge  I 
Der  Stein  in  Sumpf 

Macht  keine  Binge. 

Liohtenberg  asks :  When  a  head  and  a  book  come 
into  collision,  and  one  sounds  hollow,  is  it  always  the 
book  ?  And  in  another  place  :  Works  like  this  are  as 
a  mirror  ;  if  an  ass  looks  in,  you  cannot  expect  an 
apostle  to  look  out.  "We  should  do  well  to  remember 
old  Gellert's  fine  and  touching  lament,  that  the  best 
gifts  of  all  find  the  fewest  admirers,  and  that  most 
men  mistake  the  bad  for  the  good, — a  daily  evil  that 
nothing  can  prevent,  like  a  plague  which  no  remedy 
can  cure.  There  is  but  one  thing  to  be  done,  though 
how  difficult ! — the  foolish  must  become  wise, — and 
that  they  can  never  be.  The  value  of  life  they  never 
know ;  they  see  with  the  outer  eye  but  never  with 

1  Ecclesiasticus,  xxii.,  8. 

2  Act  iv. ,  sc.  2. 


FAME. 


123 


the  mind,  and  praise  the  trivial  because  the  good  is 
strange  to  them : — 

Nie  kennen  sie  den  Werth  der  Dinge, 
Ihr  Auge  schliesst,  nicht  ihr  Verstand  ; 

Sie  loben  ewig  das  Geringe 

Weil  sie  das  Gh.de  nie  gekannt. 

To  the  intellectual  incapacity  which,  as  Goethe 
says,  fails  to  recognize  and  appreciate  the  good  which 
exists,  must  be  added  something  which  comes  into 
play  everywhere,  the  moral  baseness  of  mankind, 
here  taking  the  form  of  envy.  The  new  fame  that  a 
man  wins  raises  him  afresh  over  the  heads  of  his 
fellows,  who  are  thus  degraded  in  proportion.  All 
conspicuous  merit  is  obtained  at  the  cost  of  those  who 
possess  none ;  or,  as  Goethe  has  it  in  the  West  Ostlicher 
Divan,  another's  praise  is  one's  own  depreciation— 

Wenn  wir  Andern  Ehre  geben 
Miissen  toir  uns  selbst  entadeln. 

We  see,  then,  how  it  is  that,  whatever  be  the  form 
which  excellence  takes,  mediocrity,  the  common  lot  of 
by  far  the  greatest  number,  is  leagued  against  it  in  a 
conspiracy  to  resist,  and  if  possible,  to  suppress  it. 
The  pass-word  of  this  league  is  A  bas  le  merite.  Nay 
more;  those  who  have  done  something  themselves, 
and  enjoy  a  certain  amount  of  fame,  do  not  care  about 
the  appearance  of  a  new  reputation,  because  its 
success  is  apt  to  throw  theirs  into  the  shade.  Hence, 
Goethe  declares  that  if  we  had  to  depend  for  our  life 
upon   the   favour  of   others,  we   should  never   have 


\ 


N 


124  THE  WISDOM   OF   LIFE. 

lived  at  all;  from  their  desire  to  appear  important 
themselves,  people  gladly  ignore  our  very  existence : — 

Hcitte  ich  gezaudert  zu  werden, 
Bis  man  miiJs  Leben  gegonnt, 
Ich  ware  noch  nicht  auf  Erden, 
Wie  ihr  begreifen  kb'nnt, 
Wenn  ihr  seht,  wie  sie  sich  geberden, 
Die,  wn  etwas  zu  scheinen, 
Mich  geme  mdchten  verneinen. 

Honour,  on  the  contrary,  generally  meets  with  fair 
appreciation,  and  is  not  exposed  to  the  onslaught  of 
envy ;  nay,  every  man  is  credited  with  the  possession 
of  it  until  the  contrary  is  proved.  But  fame  has  to 
be  won  in  despite  of  envy,  and  the  tribunal  whicli 
awards  the  laurel  is  composed  of  judges  biassed 
against  the  applicant  from  the  very  first.  Honour  is 
something  which  we  are  able  and  ready  to  share  with 
everyone  ;  fame  suffers  encroachment  and  is  rendered 
more  unattainable  in  proportion  as  more  people  come 
by  it.  Further,  the  difficulty  of  winning  fame  by  any 
given  work  stands  in  inverse  ratio  to  the  number  of 
people  who  are  likely  to  read  it ;  and  hence  it  is 
so  much  harder  to  become  famous  as  the  author  of  a 
learned  work  than  as  a  writer  who  aspires  only  to 
amuse.  It  is  hardest  of  all  in  the  case  of  philoso- 
phical works,  because  the  result  at  which  they  aim  is 
rather  vague,  and,  at  the  same  time,  useless  from  a 
material  point  of  view.  They  appeal  chiefly  to  readers 
who  are  working  on  the  same  lines  themselves. 

It  is  clear,  then,  from  what  I  have  said  as  to  the 
difficulty  of  winning  fame,  that  those  who  labour,  not 
out   of  love  for  their  subject,  nor  from  pleasure  in 


FAME.  125 

pursuing  it,  but  under  the  stimulus  of  ambition,  rarely 
or  never  leave  mankind  a  legacy  of  immortal  works. 
The  man  who  seeks  to  do  what  is  good  and  genuine, 
must  avoid  what  is  bad,  and  be  ready  to  defy  the 
opinions  of  the  mob,  nay,  even  to  despise  it  and  its 
misleaders.  Hence  the  truth  of  the  remark,  (especi- 
ally insisted  upon  byOsorius  de  Gloria), that  fame  shuns 
those  who  seek  it,  and  seeks  those  who  shun  it ;  for 
the  one  adapt  themselves  to  the  taste  of  their  con- 
temporaries, and  the  others  work  in  defiance  of  it. 

But,  difficult  though  it  be  to  acquire  fame,  it  is  an 
easy  thing  to  keep  it  when  once  acquired.  Here, 
again,  fame  is  in  direct  opposition  to  honour,  with 
which  everyone  is  presumably  to  be  accredited. 
Honour  has  not  to  be  won;  it  must  only  not  be  lost. 
But  there  lies  the  difficulty  !  For  by  a  single  un- 
worthy action,  it  is  gone  irretrievably.  But  fame,  in 
the  proper  sense  of  the  word,  can  never  disappear ; 
for  the  action  or  wTork  by  which  it  was  acquired  can 
never  be  undone ;  and  fame  attaches  to  its  author, 
even  though  he  does  nothing  to  deserve  it  anew.  The 
fame  which  vanishes,  or  is  outlived,  proves  itself 
thereby  to  have  been  spurious,  in  other  words,  un- 
merited, and  due  to  a  momentary  over-estimate  of  a 
man's  work ;  not  to  speak  of  the  kind  of  fame  which 
Hegel  enjoyed,  and  which  Lichtenberg  describes  as 
trumpeted  forth  by  a  clique  of  admiring  under- 
graduates— the  resounding  echo  of  empty  heads; — 
such  a  fame  as  will  make  posterity  smile  when  it  lights 
upon  a  grotesque  architecture  of  words,  a  fine  nest 
with  the  birds  long  ago  flown ;  it  will  knock  at  the 
door  of  this  decayed  structure  of  conventionalities 


126  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

and  find  it  utterly  empty! — not  even  a  trace  oj 
thought  there  to  invite  the  passer-by. 

The  truth  is  that  fame  means  nothing  but  what  a 
man  is  in  comparison  with  others.  It  is  essentially 
relative  in  character,  and  therefore  onty  indirectly 
valuable;  for  it  vanishes  the  moment  other  people 
become  what  the  famous  man  is.  Absolute  value  can 
be  predicated  only  of  what  a  man  possesses  under  any 
and  all  circumstances, — here,  what  a  man  is  directly 
and  in  himself.  It  is  the  possession  of  a  great  heart  or  a 
great  head,  and  not  the  mere  fame  of  it,  which  is 
worth  having,  and  conducive  to  happiness.  Not 
fame,  but  that  which  deserves  to  be  famous,  is  what 
a  man  should  hold  in  esteem.  This  is,  as  it  were,  the 
true  underlying  substance,  and  fame  is  only  an  acci- 
dent, affecting  its  subject  chiefly  as  a  kind  of  external 
symptom,  which  serves  to  confirm  his  own  opinion  of 
himself.  Light  is  not  visible  unless  it  meets  witb 
something  to  reflect  it ;  and  talent  is  sure  of  itself 
only  when  its  fame  is  noised  abroad.  But  fame  is  not 
a  certain  symptom  of  merit ;  because  you  can  have 
the  one  without  the  other  ;  or,  as  Lessing  nicely  puts 
it,  Some  people  obtain  fame,  and  others  deserve  it. 

It  would  be  a  miserable  existence  which  should 
make  its  value  or  want  of  value  depend  upon  what 
other  people  think ;  but  such  would  be  the  life  of  a 
hero  or  a  genius  if  its  worth  consisted  in  fame,  that 
is,  in  the  applause  of  the  world.  Every  man  lives 
and  exists  on  his  own  account,  and,  therefore,  mainly 
in  and  for  himself;  and  what  he  is  and  the  whole 
manner  of  his  being  concern  himself  more  than  any- 
one else;  so  if  he  is  not  worth  much  in  this  respect, 


FAME.  127 

he  cannot  be  worth  much  otherwise.  The  idea  which 
other  people  form  of  his  existence  is  something 
secondary,  derivative,  exposed  to  all  the  chances  of 
fate,  and  in  the  end  affecting  him  but  very  indirectly. 
Besides,  other  people's  heads  are  a  wretched  place  to 
be  the  home  of  a  man's  true  happiness — a  fanciful 
happiness  perhaps,  but  not  a  real  one. 

And  what  a  mixed  company  inhabits  the  Temple 
of  Universal  Fame  ! — generals,  ministers,  charlatans, 
jugglers,  dancers,  singers,  millionaires  and  Jews  !  It 
is  a  temple  in  which  more  sincere  recognition,  more 
genuine  esteem,  is  given  to  the  several  excellences  of 
such  folk,  than  to  superiority  of  mind,  even  of  a  high 
order,  which  obtains  from  the  great  majority  only  a 
verbal  acknowledgment. 

From  the  point  of  view  of  human  happiness,  fame 
is,  surely,  nothing  but  a  very  rare  and  delicate  morsel 
for  the  appetite  that  feeds  on  pride  and  vanity — an 
appetite  which,  however  carefully  concealed,  exists  to 
an  immoderate  degree  in  every  man,  and  is,  perhaps, 
strongest  of  all  in  those  who  set  their  hearts  on  be- 
coming famous  at  any  cost.  Such  people  generally 
have  to  wait  some  time  in  uncertainty  as  to  their  own 
value,  before  the  opportunity  comes  which  will  put  it 
to  the  proof  and  let  other  people  see  what  they  are 
made  of;  but  until  then,  they  feel  as  if  they  were 
suffering  secret  injustice.1 

But,  as  I  explained  at  the  beginning  of  this  chapter, 

1  Our  greatest  pleasure  consists  in  being  admired  ;  but  those 
who  admire  us,  even  if  they  have  every  reason  to  do  so,  are  slow 
to  express  their  sentiments.  Hence  he  is  the  happiest  man 
who,  no  matter  how,  manages  sincerely  to  admire  himself — so 
long  as  other  people  leave  him  alone. 


128  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

an  unreasonable  value  is  set  upon  other  people's 
opinion,  and  one  quite  disproportionate  to  its  real 
worth.  Hobbes  has  some  strong  remarks  on  this  sub- 
ject; and  no  doubt  he  is  quite  right.  Mental  pleasure, 
he  writes,  and  ecstasy  of  any  kind,  arise  when,  on  com- 
paring ourselves  with  others,  ive  come  to  the  conclusion 
that  we  may  think  well  of  ourselves.  So  we  can  easily 
understand  the  great  value  which  is  always  attached 
to  fame,  as  worth  any  sacrifices  if  there  is  the  slightest 
hope  of  attaining  it. 

Fame  is  the  spur  that  the  clear  spirit  doth  raise 

(That  last  infirmity  of  noble  mind) 

To  scorn  delights  and  live  laborious  days. x 

And  again : 

How  hard  it  is  to  climb 
The  heights  where  Fame's  proud  temple  sh  ines  afar  ! 

We  can  thus  understand  how  it  is  that  the  vainest 
people  in  the  world  are  always  talking  about  la  gloire, 
with  the  most  implicit  faith  in  it  as  a  stimulus  to 
great  actions  and  great  works.  But  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  fame  is  something  secondary  in  its  char- 
acter, a  mere  echo  or  reflection — as  it  were,  a  shadow 
or  symptom — of  merit;  and,  in  any  case,  what  excites 
admiration  must  be  of  more  value  than  the  admiration 
itself.  The  truth  is  that  a  man  is  made  happy,  not 
by  fame,  but  by  that  which  brings  him  fame,  by  his 
merits,  or  to  speak  more  correctly,  by  the  disposition 
and  capacity  from  which  his  merits  proceed,  whether 
they  be  moral  or  intellectual.     The  best  side  of  a 

1  Milton.     Lycidas 


FAME.  129 

man'-*  nature  must  of  necessity  be  more  important  for 
him  than  for  anyone  else :  the  reflection  of  it,  the 
opinion  which  exists  in  the  heads  of  others,  is  a  matter 
that  can  affect  him  only  in  a  very  subordinate  degree. 
He  who  deserves  fame  without  getting  it  possesses  by 
far  the  more  important  element  of  happiness,  which 
should  console  him  for  tbe  loss  of  the  other.  It  is  not 
that  a  man  is  thought  to  be  great  by  masses  of  in- 
competent and  often  infatuated  people,  but  that  he 
really  is  great,  which  should  move  us  to  envy  his 
position ;  and  his  happiness  lies,  not  in  the  fact  that 
posterity  will  hear  of  him,  but  that  he  is  the  creator 
of  thoughts  worthy  to  be  treasured  up  and  studied 
for  hundreds  of  years. 

Besides,  if  a  man  has  done  this,  he  possesses  some- 
thing which  cannot  be  wrested  from  him;  and,  unlike 
fame,  it  is  a  possession  dependent  entirely  upon 
himself.  If  admiration  were  his  chief  aim,  there 
would  be  nothing  in  him  to  admire.  This  is  just 
what  happens  in  the  case  of  false,  that  is,  unmerited, 
fame  ;  for  its  recipient  lives  upon  it  without  actually 
possessing  the  solid  substratum  of  which  fame  is  the 
outward  and  visible  sign.  False  fame  must  often  put 
its  possessor  out  of  conceit  with  himself ;  for  the 
time  may  come  when,  in  spite  of  the  illusions  born  of 
self-love,  he  will  feel  giddy  on  the  heights  which  he 
was  never  meant  to  climb,  or  look  upon  himself  as 
spurious  coin;  and  in  the  anguish  of  threatened 
discovery  and  well-merited  degradation,  he  will  read 
the  sentence  of  posterity  on  the  foreheads  of  the  wise 
— like  a  man  who  owes  his  property  to  a  forged  will. 

The  truest  fame,  the  fame  that  comes  after  death. 

J 


130  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

is  never  heard  of  by  its  recipient ;  and  yet  he  ig 
called  a  happy  man.  His  happiness  lay  both  in  the 
possession  of  those  great  qualities  which  won  him 
fame,  and  in  the  opportunity  that  was  granted  him 
of  developing  them — the  leisure  he  had  to  act  as  he 
pleased,  to  dedicate  himself  to  his  favourite  pursuits. 
It  is  only  work  done  from  the  heart  that  ever  gains 
the  laurel. 

Greatness  of  soul,  or  wealth  of  intellect,  is  what 
makes  a  man  happy — intellect,  such  as,  when  stamped 
on  its  productions,  will  receive  the  admiration  of  cen- 
turies to  come, — thoughts  which  made  him  happy  at 
the  time,  and  will  in  their  tarn  be  a  source  of  study 
and  delight  to  the  noblest  minds  of  the  most  remote 
posterity.  The  value  of  posthumous  fame  lies  in 
deserving  it ;  and  this  is  its  own  reward.  Whether 
works  destined  to  fame  attain  it  in  the  lifetime  of 
their  author  is  a  chance  affair,  of  no  very  great  im- 
portance. For  the  average  man  has  no  critical  power 
of  his  own,  and  is  absolutely  incapable  of  appreciating 
the  difficulty  of  a  great  work.  People  are  always 
swayed  by  authority  ;  and  where  fame  is  widespread, 
it  means  that  ninety -nine  out  of  a  hundred  take  it 
on  faith  alone.  If  a  man  is  famed  far  and  wide  in 
his  own  life-time,  he  will,  if  he  is  wise,  not  set  too 
much  value  upon  it,  because  it  is  no  more  than  the 
echo  of  a  few  voices,  which  the  chance  of  a  day  has 
touched  in  his  favour. 

Would  a  musician  feel  flattered  by  the  loud  ap- 
plause of  an  audience  if  he  knew  that  they  were 
nearly  all  dgaf,  and  that,  to  conceal  their  infirmity, 
they  set  to  work  to  clap  vigorously  as  soon  as  ever 


FAME.  131 

they  saw  one  or  two  persons  applauding  ?  And  what 
would  he  say  if  he  got  to  know  that  those  one  or  two 
persons  had  often  taken  bribes  to  secure  the  loudest 
applause  for  the  poorest  player ! 

It  is  easy  to  see  why  contemporary  praise  so 
seldom  developes  into  posthumous  fame.  D'Alembert, 
in  an  extremely  fine  description  of  the  temple  of 
literary  fame,  remarks  that  the  sanctuary  of  the 
temple  is  inhabited  by  the  great  dead,  who  during 
their  life  had  no  place  there,  and  by  a  very  few  living 
persons,  who  are  nearly  all  ejected  on  their  death. 
Let  me  remark,  in  passing,  that  to  erect  a  monument 
to  a  man  in  his  lifetime  is  as  much  as  declaring  that 
posterity  is  not  to  be  trusted  in  its  judgment  of  him* 
If  a  man  does  happen  to  see  his  own  true  fame,  it  can 
very  rarely  be  before  he  is  old,  though  there  have 
been  artists  and  musicians  who  have  been  exceptions 
to  this  rule,  but  very  few  philosophers.  This  is 
confirmed  by  the  portraits  of  people  celebrated  by 
their  works ;  for  most  of  them  are  taken  only  after 
their  subjects  have  attained  celebrity,  generally  de- 
picting them  as  old  and  grey ;  more  especially  if 
philosophy  has  been  the  work  of  their  lives.  From  a 
eudsemonistic  standpoint,  this  is  a  very  proper 
arrangement ;  as  fame  and  youth  are  too  much  for  a 
mortal  at  one  and  the  same  time.  Life  is  such  a 
poor  business  that  the  strictest  economy  must  be 
exercised  in  its  good  things.  Youth  has  enough  and 
to  spare  in  itself,  and  must  rest  content  with  what  it 
has.  But  when  the  delights  and  joys  of  life  fall  away 
in  old  age,  as  the  leaves  from  a  tree  in  autumn,  fame 
buds  forth  opportunely,  like  a  plant  that  is  green  in 


132  THE  WISDOM   OF   LIFE. 

winter.  Fame  is,  as  it  were,  the  fruit  that  must  grow 
all  the  summer  before  it  can  be  enjoyed  at  Yule. 
There  is  no  greater  consolation  in  age  than  the  feeling 
of  having  put  the  whole  force  of  one's  youth  into 
works  which  still  remain  young. 

Finally,  let  us  examine  a  little  more  closely  the 
kinds  of  fame  which  attach  to  various  intellectual 
pursuits ;  for  it  is  with  fame  of  this  sort  that  my  re- 
marks are  more  immediately  concerned. 

I  think  it  may  be  said  broadly  that  the  intellectual 
superiority  it  denotes  consists  in  forming  theories, 
that  is,  new  combinations  of  certain  facts.  These 
facts  may  be  of  very  different  kinds ;  but  the  better 
they  are  known,  and  the  more  they  come  within 
everyday  experience,  the  greater  and  wider  will  be 
the  fame  which  is  to  be  won  by  theorising  about  them. 
For  instance,  if  the  facts  in  question  are  numbers  or 
lines  or  special  branches  of  science,  such  as  physics, 
zoology,  botany,  anatomy,  or  corrupt  passages  in 
ancient  authors,  or  undecipherable  inscriptions,  written, 
it  may  be,  in  some  unknown  alphabet,  or  obscure  points 
in  history ;  the  kind  of  fame  which  may  be  obtained 
by  correctly  manipulating  such  facts  will  not  extend 
much  beyond  those  who  make  a  study  of  them — a 
small  number  of  persons,  most  of  whom  live  retired 
lives  and  are  envious  of  others  who  become  famous  in 
their  special  branch  of  knowledge. 

But  if  the  facts  be  such  as  are  known  to  everyone, 
for  example,  the  fundamental  characteristics  of  the 
liuman  mind  or  the  human  heart,  which  are  shared  by 
all  alike,  or  the  great  physical  agencies  which  are 
constantly  in  operation  before  our  eyes,  or  the  general 


FAME.  133 

course  of  natural  laws,  the  kind  of  fame  which  is  to 
be  won  by  spreading  the  light  of  a  new  and  mani- 
festly true  theory  in  regard  to  them,  is  such  as  in  time 
will  extend  almost  all  over  the  civilised  world :  for  if 
the  facts  be  such  as  everyone  can  grasp,  the  theory 
also  will  be  generally  intelligible.  But  the  extent  of 
the  fame  will  depend  upon  the  difficulties  overcome ; 
and  the  more  generally  known  the  facts  are,  the  harder 
it  will  be  to  form  a  theory  that  shall  be  both  new  and 
true;  because  a  great  many  heads  will  have  been 
occupied  with  them,  and  there  will  be  little  or  no  possi- 
bility of  saying  anything  that  has  not  been  said  before. 
On  the  other  hand,  facts  which  are  not  accessible  to 
everybody,  and  can  be  got  at  only  after  much  diffi- 
culty and  labour,  nearly  always  admit  of  new  combi- 
nations and  theories;  so  that,  if  sound  understanding 
and  judgment  are  brought  to  bear  upon  them — quali- 
ties which  do  not  involve  very  higli  intellectual  power 
— a  man  may  easily  be  so  fortunate  as  to  light  upon 
some  new  theory  in  regard  to  them  which  shall  be 
also  true.  But  fame  won  on  such  paths  does  not  ex- 
tend much  beyond  those  who  possess  a  knowledge  of 
the  facts  in  question.  To  solve  problems  of  this  sort 
requires,  no  doubt,  a  great  deal  of  study  and  labour, 
if  only  to  get  at  the  facts ;  whilst  on  the  path  where 
the  greatest  and  most  widespread  fame  is  to  be  won, 
the  facts  may  be  grasped  without  any  labour  at  all. 
But  just  in  proportion  as  less  labour  is  necessary,  more 
talent  or  genius  is  required ;  and  between  such  quali- 
ties and  the  drudgery  of  research  no  comparison  is 
possible,  in  respect  either  of  their  intrinsic  value,  or  of 
the  estimation  in  which  they  are  held. 


134  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE. 

And  so  people  who  feel  that  they  possess  solid  in- 
tellectual capacity  and  a  sound  judgment,  and  yet 
cannot  claim  the  highest  mental  powers,  should  not 
be  afraid  of  laborious  study ;  for  by  its  aid  they  may 
work  themselves  above  the  great  mob  of  humanity 
who  have  the  facts  constantly  before  their  eyes,  and 
reach  those  secluded  spots  which  are  accessible  to 
learned  toil.  For  this  is  a  sphere  where  there  are 
infinitely  fewer  rivals,  and  a  man  of  only  moderate 
capacity  may  soon  find  an  opportunity  of  proclaiming 
a  theory  that  shall  be  both  new  and  true ;  nay,  the 
merit  of  his  discovery  will  partly  rest  upon  the  diffi- 
culty of  coming  at  the  facts.  But  applause  from  one's 
fellow-students,  who  are  the  only  persons  with  a 
knowledge  of  the  subject,  sounds  very  faint  to  the 
far-off  multitude.  And  if  we  follow  up  this  sort  of 
fame  far  enough,  we  shall  at  last  come  to  a  point 
where  facts  very  difficult  to  get  at  are  in  themselves 
sufficient  to  lay  a  foundation  of  fame,  without  any 
necessity  for  forming  a  theory ; — travels,  for  instance, 
in  remote  and  little-known  countries,  which  make  a 
man  famous  by  what  he  has  seen,  not  by  what  he  has 
thought.  The  great  advantage  of  this  kind  of  fame 
is  that  to  relate  what  one  has  seen,  is  much  easier 
than  to  impart  one's  thoughts,  and  people  are  apt  to 
understand  descriptions  better  than  ideas,  reading 
the  one  more  readily  than  the  other ;  for,  as  Asmus 
says, 

When  one  goes  forth  a-voyaging 
He  has  a  tale  to  tell. 

And  yet,  for  all  that,  a  personal  acquaintance  with 


FAME.  135 

celebrated  travellers  often  reminds  us  of  a  line  from 
Horace — new  scenes  do  not  always  mean  new  ideas — 

Coelum  non  animum  mutant  qui  trans  mare  currunt. 1 

But  if  a  man  finds  himself  in  possession  of  great 
mental  faculties,  such  as  alone  should  venture  on  the 
solution  of  the  hardest  of  all  problems — those  which 
concern  nature  as  a  whole  and  humanity  in  its  widest 
range,  he  will  do  well  to  extend  his  view  equally  in 
all  directions,  without  ever  straying  too  far  amid  the 
intricacies  of  various  by-paths,  or  invading  regions 
little  known ;  in  other  words,  without  occupying  him- 
self with  special  branches  of  knowledge,  to  say  nothing 
of  their  petty  details.  There  is  no  necessity  for  him 
to  seek  out  subjects  difficult  of  access,  in  order  to 
escape  a  crowd  of  rivals ;  the  common  objects  of  life 
will  give  him  material  for  new  theories  at  once  serious 
and  true  ;  and  the  service  he  renders  will  be  appreci- 
ated by  all  those — and  they  form  a  great  part  of  man- 
kind— who  know  the  facts  of  which  he  treats.  What 
a  vast  distinction  there  is  between  students  of  physics, 
chemistry,  anatomy,  mineralogy,  zoology,  philology, 
history,  and  the  men  who  deal  with  the  great  facts  of 
human  life,  the  poet  and  the  philosopher ! 
1  Epist.  I.  II. 


END   OF   THE   FIRST  PART. 


(X\  nLllbt.  jLuasiqL 


SCHOPENHAUEE    SEEIES. 


Uniformly  Bound  in  Cloth.     Price  Xs.  6d. 


I.  THE  WISDOM  OF  LIFE  :  Being  the  First  Part 
of  Arthur  Schopenhauer's  ApJwrismen  zur  Leben- 
sweisheit.  Translated,  with  a  Preface,  by  T. 
Bailey  Saunders,  M.A.     Fifth  Edition. 

Press  Notices. 

"  Schopenhauer  is  not  simply  a  moralist  writing  in  his  study  and 
applying  abstract  principles  to  the  conduct  of  thought  and  action, 
but  is  also  in  a  large  measure  a  man  of  the  world,  with  a  firm  grasp 
of  the  actual,  and  is  therefore  able  to  speak  in  a  way  which,  to  use 
Bacon's  phrase,  comes  home  to  men's  business  and  bosoms.  The 
essentially  practical  character  of  his  Wisdom  of  Life  is  evidenced 
by  his  frequent  recourse  to  illustrations,  and  his  singularly  apt  use 
of  them.  .  .  .  This  allusive,  illustrative  method  of  treatment 
gives  to  bis  work  a  special  charm  in  which  similar  treatises  are,  as 
a  rule,  deficient.  Mr.  Bailey  Saunders'  introductory  essay  adds 
much  to  the  value  and  interest  of  a  singularly  suggestive  volume." 
— Manchester  Examiner. 

"  Schopenhauer,  as  seen  through  the  medium  of  Mr.  Saunders' 
translation,  might  easily  become  a  widely-read  and  popular 
preacher  among  us.  .  .  .  We  are  very  much  indebted  to  Mr. 
Saunders  for  his  neat  little  essay  as  an  introduction  to  an  author 
interesting  and  easily  understanded  o*  the  people." — Cambridge 
Review. 


2.  COUNSELS  AND  MAXIMS:  Being  the  Second 
Part  of  Arthur  Schopenhauer's  Aphorismen  zur 
Lebensweisheit.  Translated  by  T.  Bailey  Saunders, 
M.A.     Fourth  Edition. 


M  In  publishing  these  two  little  volumes  Mr.  Saunders  has  done 
English  readers  a  genuine  service.  .  .  .  He  has  also  introduced 
his  translation  by  a  clear  and  thoroughly  helpful  preface,  in  which 
are  denned  with  sufficient  exactness  Schopenhauer's  philosophic 
standpoint  and  the  relation  of  his  minor  writings  to  his  chief 
metaphysical  treatise.  .  .  .  Schopenhauer  is  commonly  ranked 
among  the  few  philosophers,  including  our  own  Berkeley,  who 
possess  a  literary  style.  The  aphorisms  give  an  excellent  sample 
of  this  style.  By  their  very  form  they  exhibit  at  its  best  Schopen- 
hauer's characteristic  manner — his  directness,  his  momentum,  his 
brevity.  .  .  .  Even  in  point  of  sjibstance,  it  contains  many  a 
keen  observation,  and  enforces  unpalatable,  but  eminently  whole- 
some truths.  .  .  .  Nor  do  we  remember  to  have  met  with  a 
finer  plea,  on  the  whole,  for  that  inner  self-culture  which  is  the 
great  and  unfailing  condition  of  human  happiness." — Athenaeum. 


3.  RELIGION  :  a    Dialogue,  and  other  Essays. 

By  Arthur  Schopenhauer.  Selected  and  Translated 
by  T.  Bailey  Saunders,  M.A.  Fourth  and  Enlarged 
Edition. 

"In  this  modest  volume  we  have  a  selection  of  very  readable 
essays  from  the  writings  of  the  famous  pessimistic  philosopher, 
clothed  in  good,  intelligible  English." — Literary  World. 

"Mr.  Saunders'  extracts  from  Schopenhauer's  Parerga  und 
Paralipomena  make  a  most  readable  booklet.  They  do  not  deal 
with  the  more  technical  aspects  of  his  philosophy  .  .  .  but 
contain  some  of  Schopenhauer's  brilliant  obiter  dicta  on  matters  of 
more  immediate  popular  interest." — Scots  Observer. 

"  There  is  no  doubt  either  as  to  the  public  interest  taken  in 
Schopenhauer  or  as  to  the  services  rendered  to  his  memory  by  Mr. 
Saunders.     This  is  a  very  handy  and  useful  little  book." — Spectator. 


4.  THE  ART  OF  LITERATURE.  A  Series  of 
Essays.  By  Arthur  Schopenhauer.  Selected  and 
Translated  by  T.  Bailey  Saunders.     Third  Edition. 

"  Mr.  Saunuers  has  fitly  brought  his  Schopenhauer  series  to  a 
close  with  a  group  of  essays  on  literature.  The  essays  on  author- 
ship, style,  criticism  and  genius  are  among  the  most  attractive  and 
suggestive  of  his  writing." — Athenceum. 

"  This  final  instalment  on  the  art  of  literature  exhibits  the  sage 
at  his  best.  Mr.  Saunders  has  evidently  regarded  his  translation 
as  a  labour  of  love,  and  has  done  full  justice  to  it." — Liverpool  Post. 

"  The  translator  has  done  excellent  service  to  the  great  pessimist's 
reputation  in  this  country.  Whatever  else  these  pages  do,  they 
provoke  thought,  and  their  bitterness  is  more  often  a  tonic  than  an 
irritant. " — Inquirer. 


S  STUDIES    IN    PESSIMISM.      A    Series    of 

Essays.  By  Arthur  Schopenhauer.  Selected 
and  Translated  by  T.  Bailey  Saunders.  Fourth 
Edition. 

"We  have  once  more  to  thank  Mr.  Saunders  for  a  series  of 
extracts,  mostly  from  the  Parerga.  Like  the  former  translations 
this  one  is  extremely  well  done,  and  the  volume  should  be  popular." 
—Glasgoxo  Herald. 

"  If  others  have  been  the  prophets  of  Schopenhauer  to  the  mass 
of  English  readers,  Mr.  Saunders  may  fairly  claim  to  have  been  the 
philosopher's  interpreter.  He  has  known  how  to  make  the  pessimist 
not  only  intelligible,  but  attractive  to  the  general  reader  by  ad- 
ministering Schopenhauer's  wisdom  in  small  doses,  and  in  a  form 
not  too  highly  concentrated.  The  series  of  little  books  by  which 
Mr.  Saunders  has  done  this  still  goes  on.  The  latest  number  is  by 
no  means  the  least  interesting  of  them  all,  and  as  Mr.  Saunders' 
version  is  again  admirable.  He  unites  readable  idiomatic  English, 
untainted  by  an  infection  of  Teutonism  that  might  easily  have 
weakened  the  style." — Scotsman. 


6.  THE  ART  OF  CONTROVERSY,  and  other 
Posthumous  Papers.  By  Arthur  Schopenhauer. 
Selected  and  Translated  by  T.  Bailey  Saunders, 
M.A. 

"  By  the  selection  and  translation  of  these  essays  Mr.  Saunders 
has  conferred  a  great  boon,  not  only  on  those  who  cannot  read 
them  in  the  original,  but  on  that  busy  section  of  the  public  which 
has  to  be  content  to  form  acquaintance  with  many  authors  chiefly 
by  selections  from  their  works." — Educational  Review. 

"  Certainly  not  less  interesting  than  any  of  Mr.  Saunders'  versions 
of  Schopenhauer.  The  translation  has  the  same  clearness  and 
fluency  and  is  equally  successful  in  making  an  original  system  of 
philosophy  attractive  to  a  general  reader." — Scotsman. 


7.  ON  HUMAN  NATURE.  Essays  in  Ethics 
and  Politics.  Selected  and  Translated  by  T. 
Bailey  Saunders,  M.A. 

"  The  latest  volume  of  the  Schopenhauer  series  appears  to  main- 
tain the  standard  reached  by  earlier  volumes.  Schopenhauer  on 
his  lighter  side,  not  as  a  philosopher,  but  as  a  man  of  the  world 
and  moralist,  is  rapidly  becoming  popular  with  English  readers,  in 
consequence  of  the  care  with  which  Mr.  Saunders  administers  small 
doses  of  the  Parerga  und  Paralipow-e:  la  in  the  guise  of  most  readable 
essays.  Always  pregnant  and  thought-provoking,  they  are  tonic, 
even  when  they  irritate  most." — Cambridge  Review. 


SWAN  SONNENSGHEIN  d   CO.,  LIM.,  LONDON. 


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